I 


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Psychanalysis 


Its  Theories  and   Practical   Application 


BY 

A.  A.  BRILL,  Ph.B.,  M.D. 

Chief  of  the  Clinic  of  Psychiatry  and  Clinical  Assistant  in  Neurology, 
Columbia  University  Medical  School;  Chief  of  the  Neurological  De- 
partment of  the  Bronx  Hospital  and  Dispensary;  formerly  Assistant 
Physician  to  Central  Islip  State  Hospital,  and  to  the  Clinic  of 
Psychiatry,  Zurich 


SECOND  EDITION,   THOROUGHLY  REVISED 


PHILADELPHIA   AND  LONDON 

W.    B.    SAUNDERS    COMPANY 

1917 


Copyright,   1912,   by   W.    B.  Saunders  Company.     Reprinted   May, 
1913.     Revised,    reprinted,    and    recopyrighted    April,   1914. 


Copyright,  1914,  by  W.  B.  Saunders  Company 


Reprinted  December,  1917 


PRINTED    IN    AMERICA 


PRESS    OF 

W.     B.     SAUNDERS     COMPANY 

PHILADELPHIA 


K~ 


TO  MY  ESTEEMED  TEACHER 

PROFESSOR  DR.  SIGMUND  FREUD,  LL.  D. 

WHOSE  IDEAS  ARE  HEREIN  REPRODUCED  THIS 
BOOK  IS  AFFECTIONATELY  INSCRIBED 


i 


PREFACE  TO   THE   SECOND   EDITION 


Adhering  to  the  original  object  of  this  book,  as  set  forth 
in  the  first  preface,  it  was  thought  best  to  add  to  this  volume 
new  illustrative  material  of  a  practical  and  instructive  char- 
acter. This  was  effected  by  the  insertion  of  analyzed  dreams, 
interesting  cases,  and  two  new  chapters.  In  addition,  the 
book  has  been  thoroughly  revised  and  greatly  enlarged  by 
many  supplements.  The  new  material  comprises  discus- 
sions on  artificial  dreams,  the  unconscious  factors  in  neuroses, 
collecting  manias,  pathologic  homosexuality,  and  fairy  tales 
as  a  determinant  of  dreams  and  neurotic  symptoms.  At 
the  suggestion  of  many  readers  a  glossary  of  psychanalytic 
and  psychosexual  terms  was  added. 

Although  there  has  been  an  enormous  increase  in  the 
psychanalytic  literature  since  the  appearance  of  the  first 
edition  no  need  was  felt  for  modifying  any  of  its  essential 
principles.  The  new  material  either  confirmed  Freud's 
theories  or  provoked  discussions  of  a  purely  academic  nature 
which  cannot  here  be  entered  into.  Our  local  critics  have 
not  changed;  they  are  constantly  rehashing  what  was  said 
abroad,  and  which  was  adequately  answered  long  ago.* 
They  have  not  offered  a  single  new  idea  of  their  own.  Such 
blind  criticism  will  not  stem  the  progressive  advance  of  the 
Freudian  views.  Indeed,  the  psychanalytic  theories  have 
been  accepted  in  part  or  wholly  by  some  of  the  leading 

*  Those  who  are  interested  may  read  Bleuler:  Die  Psychanalyse 
Freud's;  Jahrb.  f.  Psychoanal.  und  Psychopathol.  Forschungen,  Bd.  11, 
1911;  and  Ibid:  Kritik  der  Freudschen  Theorien,  AUegemeine  Zeit- 
schrift  fur  Psychiatrie,  LXX,  5. 


VI  PREFACE    TO    THE    SECOND    EDITION 

active  psychiatrists  in  this  country  and  abroad.  To  quote 
Jones:  "Assent  has  been  given  to  the  chief  of  Freud's  con- 
clusions by  such  men  of  scientific  eminence  and  sane  judg- 
ment as  Professors  Bleuler,  August  Hoch,  Jung,  Adolph 
Meyer,  and  Putnam.*  Many  other  names  of  equal  promi- 
nence could  now  be  added.  Any  one  conversant  with  medical 
and  lay  literature  readily  sees  the  great  significance  of 
Freud's  psychologic  principles  in  modern  thought,  and  the 
influence  of  psychanalysis  on  the  treatment  of  nervous  and 
mental  cases. 

As  gratifying  as  this  is,  attention  must  be  called  to  one 
great  danger,  the  danger  of  the  psychanalytic  method  in 
untrained  hands.  The  necessary  training  and  other 
requisites  for  this  work  have  been  discussed  in  the  preface 
to  the  first  edition,  but,  in  view  of  later  developments,  it 
will  not  be  amiss  to  emphasize  a  few  more  points. 

As  psychanalysis  deals  with  mental  factors,  it  is  only  just 
to  expect  that  those  employing  it  should  have  a  training  in 
psychiatry  and  neurology.  The  normal  and  abnormal  men- 
tal trends  and  reactions  of  each  patient  must  be  known  be- 
fore psychanalysis  is  undertaken,  and  these  can  only  be 
correctly  diagnosed  by  those  trained  in  mental  work;  for 
not  every  nervous  and  mental  case  lends  itself  to  analysis, 
and  proper  selection  of  cases  would  obviate  many  failures 
and  criticism.  The  writer  has  seen  much  harm  done  to 
patients  by  "wild  psychanalysts,"  who  had  no  conception 
of  what  they  were  doing.  Those  who  wish  to  take  up  psych- 
analytic work  should  proceed  in  the  same  manner  as  in  any 
other  specialty.  The  reading  of  some  theoretic  works  about 
the  eye  or  throat  does  not  make  an  ophthalmatologist  or 
laryngologist,  nor  does  theoretic  knowledge  make  a  psych- 
analyst.  It  must  be  remembered  that  all  the  pioneers  in 
this  field  have  been  neurologists  and  psychiatrists  first. 
To  practice  psychanalysis  without  previous  training  in  men- 

*  "  Reflections  on  Some  Criticisms  of  the  Psycho-analytic  Method  of 
Treatment,"  American  Journal  of  the  Medical  Sciences,  July,  1911. 


PREFACE   TO   THE    SECOND    EDITION  Vll 

tal  work  is  as  dangerous  as  practicing  surgery  without  a 
knowledge  of  anatomy;  and,  as  in  surgery,  no  definite  rules 
can  be  laid  down,  one  must  be  guided  by  what  he  finds; 
proficiency  depends  on  a  sound  preparation  and  much 
experience. 

As  the  two  new  chapters  have  originally  appeared  in  the 
New  York  Medical  Journal,  I  am  indebted  to  the  editor  for 
permitting  me  to  use  the  same. 

A.  A.  BRILL. 

New  York  City. 


PREFACE 

Like  many  others  in  the  field  of  nervous  and  mental 
work,  I  received  my  training  in  the  State  Hospital  for  the 
insane.  It  was  my  fortune  to  enter  the  hospital  service 
at  a  very  important  period  of  its  development.  Dr. 
Frederick  Peterson  was  then  president  of  the  Commission 
in  Lunacy,  and  it  was  mainly  through  his  untiring  energy 
that  the  New  York  State  hospitals  were  thoroughly  modern- 
ized and  put  on  a  firm  scientific  basis.  It  was  also  mostly 
through  his  efforts  that  Dr.  Adolf  Meyer  became  director 
of  the  Pathological  Institute  at  Ward's  Island,  N.  Y. 

The  advent  of  Dr.  Meyer  marks  a  new  epoch  in  the 
N.  Y.  State  hospital  service.  An  accomplished  neuro- 
pathologist and  psychiatrist  of  long  experience,  he  soon 
instilled  new  life  and  interest  into  the  work  by  giving 
regular  courses  of  lectures  and  demonstrations  to  the 
interns  on  the  theories  and  methods  then  in  vogue.  The 
old  way  of  writing  a  one  line  note  about  the  patient's 
mental  and  physical  condition  every  three  or  six  months 
had  to  stop  despite  the  grumbling  of  the  "old  timers," 
and  we  were  required  to  make  frequent  and  comprehensive 
examinations  of  our  patients  and  note  carefully  what  we 
found.  These  examinations  were  made  in  accordance 
with  a  scheme  thoroughly  worked  out  by  Dr.  Adolf  Meyer, 
the  underlying  principles  of  which  were  the  teachings  of 
Kraepelin,  Wernicke  and  Ziehen.  This  good  work  has 
continued  up  to  the  present  with  excellent  results.   Since 


2  PREFACE 

I  left  the  state  service  I  have  visited  and  worked  in  some 
of  the  best  psychiatric  clinics  in  Europe,  and  I  am  glad 
to  say  that  all  things  considered  the  work  of  the  New 
York  State  Hospital  compares  very  favorably  with  the 
work  done  in  most  of  the  hospitals  of  its  kind. 

What  I  say  in  reference  to  the  N.  Y.  State  hospitals 
can  be  readily  applied  with  some  modifications  to  most  of 
the  hospitals  for  the  insane  in  this  country.  It  is  well 
known  that  within  the  last  ten  to  twelve  years  the  manage- 
ment and  treatment  of  the  insane  in  this  country  have 
undergone  a  marked  transformation,  which  is  of  great 
benefit  to  the  patient,  the  doctor  and  the  public.  The 
State  hospitals  are  now  treating  the  patients  as  patients 
in  the  true  sense  of  the  word;  they  are  rapidly  filling  up  an 
enormous  gap  in  the  medical  profession  by  training  doctors 
how  to  treat  the  insane,  and  they  are  gradually  abolishing 
the  popular  prejudices  against  hospitals  for  the  insane. 
The  medical  schools,  too,  are  now  paying  more  though  not 
enough  attention  to  mental  diseases;  and  last,  but  not 
least,  excellent  and  commendable  wTork  is  being  done  by 
the  Social  Service  Departments  and  the  National  Society 
for  Mental  Hygiene. 

The  progressive  evolution  in  the  study  of  mental  dis- 
eases has  called  attention  to  another  neglected  field  in 
which  the  most  important  work  is  still  to  be  done.  I 
refer  to  the  so-called  "borderline"  cases,  the  neuroses 
and  mild  psychoses  who  never  reach  the  State  hospitals, 
but  form  the  greatest  proportion  of  clinic  and  dispensary 
practice.  In  the  ten  years  from  1900-1909,  21 ,290  patients 
were  examined  by  the  assistants  in  the  neurological  depart- 
ment of  the  Vanderbilt  Clinic,  N.  Y.,  and  about  25%  of  this 


PREFACE  3 

number  were  diagnosed  as  neurasthenia,  psychasthenia, 
hysteria,  and  as  mild  forms  of  the  functional  psychoses.1 
Although  I  am  not  ready  to  give  statistics,  I  do  not  hesitate 
to  assert  that  the  same  conditions  prevail  in  almost  every 
clinic  and  dispensary.     A  striking  feature  in  these  border- 
line cases  is  the  fact  that  the  great  majority  run  a  chronic 
course.     Up  to  within  recent  years  no  real  effort  has  been 
made  to  understand  these  unfortunates.     It  is  gratifying 
to  note,  however,  that  a  complete  change  has  taken  place 
in  this  direction.     Physicians  now  realize  that  the  old 
adage  mens  sana  in  corpore  sano  is  not  to  be  taken  in  the 
strict  sense,  and  hence  do  not  rely  on  physical  treatment 
alone.     All  enlightened  and  progressive  physicians  recog- 
nize psychotherapy  as  an  important  therapeutic  agent  in 
the  treatment  of  these  borderline  cases  of  mental  diseases. 
Now  as  there  is  a  demand  for  psychotherapy,  the  ques- 
tion naturally  arises  as  to  which  is  the  method  of  prefer- 
ence.    Without  entering  into  the  merits  and  demerits  of 
the  different  systems  of  psychotherapy,  admitting  that  in 
competent  hands  they  are  all  good  and  useful,  and  that  I 
myself  employ  them  in  selected  cases,  I  do  not  hesitate  to 
assert  that  psychanalysis  is  the  most  rational  and  effective 
method  of  psychic  therapy.     I  say  this  after  I  have  prac- 
tised for  years  the  existing  psychotherapeutic  methods. 
Psychanalysis    is    the    only   system   of    psychotherapy 
that  deals  with  the  neuroses  as  entities  instead  of  treating 
symptoms,  as  do  hypnotism,  suggestion  and  persuasion. 
To  hypnotize  a  patient  because  he  suffers  from  obsessions 
or  phobias  is  equivalent  to  treating  the  cough  or  fever 

1  Jelliffe  and  Brill:  Statistical  Summary  of  Cases  in  Department  of 
Neurology,  Vanderbilt  Clinic,  for  Ten  Years,  1900  to  1909,  Journal 
Nervous  and  Mental  Diseases,  July,  1911. 


4  PREFACE 

regardless  of  the  disease  of  which  it  is  but  one  of  the  mani- 
festations. Hypnotism  takes  no  cognizance  of  personality, 
it  simply  imposes  blind  obedience  which  at  best  lasts 
until  worn  off.  Psychanalysis  always  concerns  itself  with 
the  individual  as  a  personality  and  enters  into  the  deepest 
recesses  of  the  mind.  It  is  for  that  reason  that  the  results 
of  psychanalysis  are  most  effective;  and  it  is  only  through 
psychanalysis  that  we  can  hope  to  gain  a  real  insight  into 
the  neuroses  and  psychoses,  a  thing  of  prime  importance 
in  the  study  of  mental  prophylaxis. 

These  assertions  are  not  based  merely  on  the  reading  of 
a  few  scattered  papers,  but  on  about  six  years  of  hard 
work  and  almost  constant  occupation  with  the  subject. 
For  it  is  only  through  hard  work  and  long  experience  that 
one  can  acquire  a  thorough  knowledge  of  Freud's  psychol- 
ogy. Recently  I  had  the  pleasure  of  talking  to  some 
who  claimed  to  have  used  psychanalysis  in  the  treatment 
of  patients,  and  who  spoke  rather  discouragingly,  saying 
that  it  produced  no  result.  Thus  one  endeavored  to  cure 
a  case  of  so-called  congenital  homosexuality  in  about  a 
dozen  sessions.  Another  stated  that  although  he  ques- 
tioned a  young  woman  for  hours  about  sex  she  showed 
no  improvement  in  her  hysteria. 

Such  statements  readily  show  the  gross  misunderstand- 
ing of  the  work.  For  it  is  not  the  treatment  of  a  few 
hours,  weeks  or  even  months  that  cures;  it  is  the  psychic 
elaboration  accomplished  during  a  long  period  by  one 
thoroughly  conversant  with  the  work.  I  do  not  think 
that  it  is  too  much  to  ask  of  one  who  wishes  to  make  use 
of  a  certain  technical  method  that  he  should  first  learn 
its  basic  principles.  One  cannot  expect  to  become 
proficient  in  psychanalysis  unless  he  has  mastered  at  least 


PREFACE 


Freud's  theories  of  the  neuroses,  the  interpretation  of 
dreams,  the  sexual  theories,  the  psychopathology  of  every- 
day life,  and  his  book  on  wit,  and  last  but  not  least  who  has 
not  had  a  training  in  nervous  and  mental  work.  Besides 
these  qualifications  one  must  know  how  to  select  his  cases. 
It  has  been  wrongly  supposed  that  we  claim  to  be  able 
to  cure  everything.  Neither  Freud  nor  any  of  his  pupils 
has  ever  advanced  such  claims.  On  the  contrary,  Freud 
has  repeatedly  emphasized  that  psychanalysis  has  a  limited 
field,  and  that  it  should  be  used  only  in  limited  cases.  Let 
us  hear  what  he  says: 

"The  former  value  of  the  person  should  not  be  over- 
looked in  the  disease,  and  you  should  refuse  a  patient 
who  does  not  possess  a  certain  degree  of  education,  and 
whose  character  is  not  in  a  measure  reliable.  We  must 
not  forget  that  there  are  also  healthy  persons  who  are  good 
for  nothing,  and  that  if  they  only  show  a  mere  touch  of  the 
neurosis,  one  is  only  too  much  inclined  to  blame  the  dis- 
ease for  incapacitating  such  inferior  persons.  I  maintain 
that  the  neurosis  does  not  in  any  way  stamp  its  bearer  as 
a  de'genere',  but  that,  frequently  enough,  it  is  found  in  the 
same  individual  associated  with  the  manifestations  of 
degeneration.  The  analytic  psychotherapy  is,  therefore, 
no  procedure  for  the  treatment  of  neuropathic  degenera- 
tion—on the  contrary  it  is  limited  by  it.  It  is  also  not  to 
be  applied  in  persons  who  are  not  prompted  by  their  own 
suffering  to  seek  treatment,  but  subject  themselves  to  it 
by  order  of  their  relatives. 

"If  one  wishes  to  take  a  safe  course  he  should  limit  his 
selection  to  persons  of  a  normal  state.  Psychoses,  con- 
fusional  states,  and  marked  (I  might  say  toxic)  depres- 
sions, are  unsuitable  for  analysis,  at  least  as  it  is  practised 


6  PREFACE 

to-day.  I  do  not  think  it  at  all  impossible  that  with  the 
proper  changes  in  the  procedure  it  will  be  possible  to  disre- 
gard this  contraindication,  and  thus  claim  a  psycho- 
therapy for  the  psychoses. 

"The  age  of  the  patient  also  plays  a  part  in  the  selec- 
tion for  the  psychoanalytic  treatment.  Persons  near  or 
over  the  age  of  fifty  lack,  on  the  one  hand,  the  plasticity 
of  the  psychic  processes  upon  which  the  therapy  depends — 
old  people  are  no  longer  educable — and  on  the  other  hand, 
the  material  which  has  to  be  elaborated  and  the  duration 
of  the  treatment  are  immensely  increased.  The  earliest 
age  limit  is  to  be  individually  determined;  youthful 
persons,  even  before  puberty,  are  excellent  subjects  for 
analysis. 

"One  should  not  attempt  psychoanalysis  when  it  is  a 
question  of  rapidly  removing  a  threatening  manifestation, 
as,  for  example,  in  the  case  of  an  hysterical  anorexia."1 

From  my  own  experience  I  fully  agree  with  Freud,  and 
I  would  add:  do  not  analyze  your  relatives,  and  when  in 
private  practice  do  not  analyze  any  patient  without 
receiving  some  compensation  for  it. 

As  the  actual  working  method  will  be  described  later, 
I  shall  confine  myself  here  to  a  few  facts,  which,  although 
strictly  speaking  belong  to  the  epilogue,  may  nevertheless 
be  worth  mentioning  in  this  connection.  With  the  begin- 
ning of  the  analysis  I  investigate  the  patient's  dream  life. 
I  instruct  him  to  write  down  his  dreams  on  awakening. 
This  is  very  important  because  dreams  give  us  the  most 
reliable  information  concerning  the  individual,  and  they 

1  Kreud:  Selected  Papers  on  Hysteria  and  other  Psychoneuroses, 
2d  Ed.,  p.  181.  Trans,  by  A.  A.  Brill,  Jour.  Ner.  and  Men.  Dis. 
Pub.  Co. 


PREFACE  7 

invariably  show  some  relation  to  the  symptoms.  I  never 
attempt,  however,  to  analyze  a  dream  before  knowing 
the  patient  for  at  least  two  weeks.  Dreams  cannot  be 
analyzed  unless  one  has  the  full  cooperation  of  the 
dreamer,  and  this  is  only  possible  after  a  certain  rapport 
has  been  established  between  the  doctor  and  the  patient. 
It  is  this  rapport,  or  the  transference1  as  we  will  call  it, 
with  which  one  must  start.  Nothing  can  be  done  without 
it,  and  unless  this  is  properly  managed  little  can  be  done 
for  the  patient.  One  may  get  excellent  results  in  surgery 
or  in  any  other  specialty  without  seeing  the  patient's  face, 
but  psychanalysis  presupposes  an  intimate  acquaintance- 
ship. There  must  be  a  mutual  understanding  and  liking 
between  doctor  and  patient.  One  must,  however,  be  on 
his  guard  lest  the  transference  be  carried  too  far.  One 
must  remember  that  one  is  dealing  with  people  whose 
libido  strives  for  fixation,  and  care  and  tact  must  there- 
fore be  exercised  to  remain  good  friends  only.  One  must 
remember  the  intimate  relationship  existing  between  love 
and  hatred,  and  that  one  can  be  readily  changed  into  the 
other.  There  are  few  neurotics,  or  for  that  matter  normal 
beings,  who  remain  absolutely  indifferent.  They  either 
like  or  dislike.  In  one  of  his  essays,  Charles  Lamb  tells 
of  two  men  who  never  met  before  who  began  to  fight  as 
soon  as  they  saw  each  other.  This  sounds  very  strange 
to  us,  though  it  is  comprehensible  in  savages,  children 
and  animals.     As  is  known,  neurotics  are  dominated  by 

'Freud:  Zur  Dynamik  der  Ubertragung,  Zentralb.  f.  Psycho- 
analyse, 2.  Jahrgang,  Heft  1  und  4.  Stekel:  Die  verschiedenen 
Formen  der  Ubertragung,  Zentralb.  f.  Psychoanalyse,  2.  Jahrgang. 
Ferenczi:  Introjection  und  Ubertragung,  Jahrbuch  f.  Psychoanalyt. 
u.  Psychopath.,  1910,  Bd.  i,  p.  451.  Jones:  The  Action  of  Suggestion 
in  Psychotherapy,  Jour,  of  Abnormal  Psychol.,  January,  1910. 


8  PREFACE 

their  infantile  or  repressed  material,  they  suffer  from  a 
failure  in  repression;  hence  behave  in  a  way  like  children. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  mention  that  we  are  criticised 
for  delving  into  sexuality.  This  is  quite  true,  but  it  is  a 
question  whether  it  merits  criticism.  Our  critics  seem 
to  have  no  conception  of  Freud's  idea  of  sexuality.  To 
us  the  term  is  very  broad,  it  really  comprises  the  whole 
love-life  of  the  individual.  As  soon  as  we  enter  into  the 
intimate  life  of  the  patient  we  are  sure  to  find  sex  in  some 
form,  and  the  best  indication  of  an  abnormal  sexual  life 
is  an  apparent  absence  of  the  sexual  factors.  It  is  natur- 
ally advisable  to  be  very  careful  in  approaching  the  subject 
so  as  not  to  shock  the  patient.  Moreover,  psychanalysis 
presupposes  a  knowledge  of  not  only  Freud's  theories  of 
sex,  but  also  a  broad  knowledge  of  psychosexuality  in 
general.  Only  those  who  are  themselves  free  from  all 
sexual  resistances  and  who  can  discuss  sex  in  a  pure- 
minded  manner  should  do  psychanalytic  work. 

In  conclusion  I  wish  to  say  that  the  main  object  of  this 
book  is  to  present  the  practical  application  of  Freud's 
theories  in  one  volume,  hoping  thereby  not  only  to  remove 
many  false  conceptions  entertained  concerning  psych- 
analysis, but  to  stimulate  further  interest  in  Freud's 
original  works. 

As  some  of  the  material  given  here  has  been  published 
before  in  the  Journal  of  Abnormal  Psychology,  the 
American  Journal  of  Insanity,  the  N.  Y.  Medical  Journal, 
the  Medical  Record,  and  the  N.  Y.  State  Journal  of  Medi- 
cine, I  take  this  opportunity  to  express  my  thanks  to  the 
editors  of  these  journals  for  allowing  me  to  utilize  the 
same.  A.  A.  BRILL. 

New  Yokk  City. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER    I  Page 

The  Psychoneuroses 11 

CHAPTER  II 
Dreams 33 

CHAPTER  III 
The  Actual  Neuroses 81 

CHAPTER  IV 

The  Compulsion  Neuroses  (Obsessions,  Doubts,  Phobias)  ....   102 

CHAPTER  V 
The  Unconscious  Factors  in  the  Neuroses 123 

CHAPTER  VI 

PSYCHANALYSIS   AND  THE   PSYCHOSES 138 

CHAPTER  VII 
Psychological  Mechanisms  op  Paranoia 189 

CHAPTER  VIII 
Psychopathology  of  Every-day  Life 208 

CHAPTER  IX 

Hysterical  Fancies  and  Dreamy  States 244 

CHAPTER  X 
The  CEdipus  Complex 262 

CHAPTER  XI 

The  Only  or  Favorite  Child  in  Adult  Life 279 

9 


10  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  XII 

Page 

Fairy  Tales  as  a  Determinant  of  Dreams  and  Neurotic 
Symptoms.  Their  Relation  to  Active  and  Passive 
Algolagnia 293 

CHAPTER  XIII 

Anal  Eroticism  and  Character 321 

CHAPTER  XIV 
Freud's  Theory  of  Wit 330 

Glossary 380 

Index 383 


PSYCHANALYSIS 

ITS  THEORIES  AND  PRACTICAL 
APPLICATION 


CHAPTER  I 
THE  PSYCHONEUROSES 

The  Development  of  Freud's  Conception  of  the  Psycho- 
neuroses  and  Psychoses,    Their  Relation  to  the 
Psychology  of  Dreams,  Sex  and  the  Psy- 
chopathology  of  Every-day  Life 

The  psychoneuroses,  the  step-children  of  medicine, 
have  of  late  received  more  attention  in  medical  literature 
than  before.  Both  here  and  abroad  it  has  been  realized 
that  there  is  a  large  group  of  diseases,  the  so-called  border- 
line cases  in  mental  diseases,  the  understanding  and  treat- 
ment of  which  has  been  sadly  neglected,  and  it  is  gratifying 
to  know  that  at  least  some  steps  have  been  taken  to  meet 
these  deficiencies.  The  wave  of  psychotherapy  which  has 
swept  the  continent  has  also  made  its  presence  felt  in  this 
country  through  its  numerous  discussions  in  both  lay  and 
professional  journals.  Abroad  its  adherents  claim  brilliant 
results;  one  need  only  review  the  numerous  works  of  the 
Nancy  and  other  schools  to  be  convinced  that  psycho- 
therapy is  no  empty  term,  but  an  actual  branch  of  medi- 

11 


12  PSYCHANALYSIS 

cine,  and  that  in  the  psychoneuroses  it  is  the  only  effective 
remedial  agent. 

Yet,  whereas  all  schools  agree  that  the  psychoneuroses 
should  be  treated  by  psychotherapy,  they  all  disagree  as 
to  the  nature  of  the  psychoneuroses.  One  need  only  scan 
the  recent  works  to  see  that  diverse  views  are  expressed 
by  the  different  investigators  on  the  subject.  These 
diversities,  in  my  opinion,  are  due  to  the  fact  that  most  of 
the  investigators  in  question  have  ignored  one  important 
factor,  namely,  individual  psychology.  Without  individ- 
ual psychology  the  riddle  of  the  neuroses,  like  the  riddle 
of  the  psychoses,  must  remain  unsolved. 

Among  the  different  views  expressed  on  the  neuroses 
those  of  Freud  stand  out  most  conspicuously.  No  recent 
theories  in  medicine  or  psychology  have  evoked  so  many 
controversies  and  discussions.  After  years  of  careful  and 
painstaking  labor  Freud  evolved  not  only  a  system  of 
psychotherapy,  but  a  new  psychology.  Unlike  all  other 
investigators  he  discarded  all  generalities  and  confined 
himself  to  the  individual.  The  individual  factors  which 
had  escaped  the  notice  of  other  investigators  he  found  to 
be  of  the  utmost  importance  in  the  psychogenetic  devel- 
opment of  personality. 

As  early  as  1895  Breuer  and  Freud  published  the 
"Studien  iiber  Hysteric"  They  found  that  hysterical 
symptoms  like  neuralgias,  paralyses,  epileptiform  attacks, 
etc.,  could  be  traced  to  actual  psychic  traumata  which  the 
patient  could  not  consciously  recall,  but  which  could  be 
readily  demonstrated  when  the  patient  was  put  in  the 
hypnotic  state.  In  other  words,  they  found  that  the 
hysterical  manifestations  were  not  accidental,  but  had  an 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  13 

actual  cause.  The  connection  between  cause  and  effect 
was  often  quite  obvious;  thus,  "A  very  sick  child  falls 
asleep  and  the  mother  exerts  all  her  will  power  to  make  no 
noise  to  awaken  it,  but  just  because  she  resolved  to  do  so 
she  emits  a  clicking  sound  with  her  tongue  (hysterical 
counter-will)  which  was  repeated  on  another  occasion 
when  she  wished  to  be  absolutely  quiet.  This  developed 
into  a  regular  tic  which  lasted  for  years."1  In  some  cases 
the  connection  is  not  so  simple,  there  being  only  a  symbolic 
relation  between  the  cause  and  the  hysterical  phenomena; 
thus,  psychic  pain  may  cause  a  neuralgia  and  moral  dis- 
gust may  cause  vomiting.  Breuer  and  Freud  then  con- 
cluded that  these  psychic  traumata,  or  the  memory  of  the 
same,  act  like  foreign  bodies  in  consciousness,  and  even 
long  after  their  occurrence  continue  to  influence  like  causa- 
tive factors.  To  quote  Freud,  "The  hysteric  suffers  mostly 
from  reminiscences.''2  Then'  symptoms  are  remnants  and 
memory  symbols  for  certain  (traumatic)  events.  A  deeper 
understanding  of  these  symbolisms  will  perhaps  be  gained 
by  comparing  them  with  memory  symbols  of  other 
spheres.  Thus  the  statues  and  monuments  with  which 
we  embellish  our  big  cities  are  such  memory  symbols.  "  If 
you  should  take  a  walk  through  London  you  would  find 
a  richly  decorated  Gothic  column  in  front  of  Charing 
Cross,  one  of  the  largest  railroad  stations  of  the  city.  On 
the  occasion  of  removing  to  Westminster  the  remains  of 
his  beloved  queen,  Eleanor,  one  of  the  old  Plantagenet 
kings  in  the  XIII  century  ordered  that  Gothic  crosses 
be  erected  at  every  station  where  the  funeral  procession 
halted,  and  Charing  Cross  is  the  last  of  the  monuments 
commemorating  this  funeral  procession.    In  another  place 


14  PSYCHANALYSIS 

in  the  city  not  far  from  London  Bridge  you  will  notice 
a  modern  lofty  column  which  is  briefly  referred  to  as  'The 
Monument. '  It  is  supposed  to  commemorate  the  big  fire 
which  started  near  there  in  1666  and  destroyed  a  large 
part  of  the  city.  These  monuments,  therefore,  like  the 
hysterical  symptoms,  are  memory  symbols.  So  far  the 
comparison  is  justified.  But  what  would  you  think  of  a 
Londoner  who  would  even  to-day  halt  in  grief  before  the 
monument  of  the  funeral  procession  of  Queen  Eleanor  in- 
stead of  continuing  on  his  way  with  the  required  haste  of 
modern  business  conditions?  Or  what  would  you  think 
of  another  who  would  stop  before  ' The  Monument'  and 
bewail  the  conflagration  of  his  beloved  native  city?  Yet 
hysteric  and  neurotic  individuals  behave  exactly  like  these 
two  impractical  Londoners.  Not  only  do  they  recall  the 
long  forgotten  painful  events,  but  they  stick  to  them 
with  all  their  emotions.  They  cannot  get  away  from  the 
past  and  neglect  for  it  reality  and  the  present.  This  fixa- 
tion of  the  psychic  life  on  the  pathogenic  traumas  is 
one  of  the  most  important,  and,  from  a  practical  view- 
point, one  of  the  most  significant  characters  of  the 
neurosis."3 

That  the  hysterical  symptoms  are  only  reminiscences 
was  proven  by  the  fact  that  the  individual  hysterical 
symptoms  disappeared  without  returning  if  one  succeeded 
in  thoroughly  awakening  the  memories  of  the  causal 
process  with  its  accompanying  affects  and  if  the  patient 
circumstantially  discussed  the  process,  giving  free  play  to 
the  affect.  The  reason  for  the  strangulation  of  the  emo- 
tion was  because  at  the  time  of  its  occurrence  it  could 
not  be  adequately  worked  off.     We  all  know  that  it  is 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  15 

not  always  possible  to  give  vent  to  our  feelings,  and  that 
an  insult  retaliated  leaves  quite  a  different  impression 
than  one  that  has  to  be  swallowed. 

The  treatment  called  "catharsis"  consisted  in  recon- 
ducting the  sum  of  excitement  from  its  false  paths  to  the 
original  conscious  idea  and  then  working  it  off  by  means  of 
intellectual  labor  and  speech.  The  patient  was  hypnotized 
and  questioned  about  the  origin  of  the  symptoms  and 
while  recalling  the  original  injuries,  either  in  hypnosis  or 
the  normal  state,  the  hemmed-in  emotions  were  dis- 
charged and  the  symptoms  disappeared.  This  is  the  so- 
called  "  abreagirung  " —  abreaction  —  which  means  to 
work  off  something  by  living  through  it  again.  It  was 
noticed  that  the  affect  appeared  with  special  intensity 
during  the  reproduction  of  the  scenes  which  gave  origin 
to  the  symptom  and  completely  disappeared  with  their 
termination.  On  the  other  hand,  no  result  was  noticed 
when  the  scenes  evoked  were  not  accompanied  by  any 
emotional  feeling. 

This  is  rather  a  brief  review  of  the  conceptions  originally 
expressed  by  Breuer  and  Freud.  It  is  from  these  prin- 
ciples that  Freud  developed  his  present  conceptions  of  the 
psychoneuroses  and  his  revolutionary  psychology. 

When  Freud  continued  to  practice  his  cathartic  treat- 
ment he  was  confronted  with  one  special  difficulty.  He 
found  that  not  all  persons  were  hypnotizable  and  as 
hypnosis  was  absolutely  essential  for  the  broadening  of 
the  patient's  consciousness,  many  patients  had  to  be  given 
up  as  they  could  not  be  hypnotized.  He  even  went  so 
far  as  to  take  one  of  these  patients  to  Bernheim,  at  Nancy, 
but  after  applying  all  his  skill  Bernheim  had  to  admit  that 


16  PSYCHANALYSIS 

he,  too,  could  not  hypnotize  the  patient.*  This  and  a  num- 
ber of  other  reasons  caused  Freud  to  avoid  hypnotism  and 
to  adopt  a  new  procedure  which  he  calls  the  psychoanalytic 
method. 

On  asking  the  patients  in  the  waking  state  whether  they 
remembered  the  first  motive  of  the  symptom  in  question, 
some  knew  nothing  while  others  recalled  something  rather 
vaguely.     Freud    then    applied    the    same    method    which 
Bernheim  used  in  awakening  the  manifestly  forgotten  im- 
pressions produced  during  somnambulism.     He  found  that 
by  urging  and  assuring  the  patients  that  they  did  remember 
and  telling  them  that  all  they  had  to  do  was  to  concentrate 
their  attention  and  repeat  the  thoughts  which  would  occur 
to  them  they  finally  recalled  the  pathogenic  ideas  without 
hypnotism.     But  as  this  urging  necessitated  much  exertion 
on  his  part,  and  showed  him  that  he  had  to  overcome  great 
resistance  in  the  patient,  he  formulated  the  following  theory: 
"Through  my  psychic  work  I  had  to  overcome  a  psychic 
force  in  the  patient  which  hindered  the  pathogenic  idea 
from  becoming  conscious."4     The  resistance  was  due  to  the 
fact  that  the  ideas  which  had  to  be  disinterred  were  all  of  a 
nature  adapted  to  provoke  the  affects  of  shame,  reproach, 
mental  pain  and  a  feeling  of  injury — they  were  altogether 
of  that  kind  which  one  would  not  like  to  experience,  and 
prefers  to  forget. 

This  gave  rise  to  Freud's  idea  of  repression;  the  patho- 
genic idea  being  of  a  painful  nature  is  incompatible  with 
the  ego,  and  is  therefore  treated  by  it  as  non-arrive.  The 
patient  wishes  to   know    nothing  about   it,   he    wishes 

*  That  not  every  person  can  be  hypnotized  has  been  long  acknowl- 
edged by  all  experienced  observers  of  the  subject. 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  17 

to  forget  it.  But  as  this  repression,  or  forgetting,  never 
succeeds  completely,  the  pathogenic  idea  continues  to 
strive  to  come  to  the  surface,  and  is  constantly  inhibited 
by  the  psychic  censor.  This  struggle  of  the  two  opposing 
forces  results  in  a  compromise.  Each  foregoes  a  part  of 
the  original  demand,  thus  meeting  the  other  half  way, 
and  the  result  of  this  mutual  accommodation  is  then  trans- 
formed into  a  hysterical  symptom  by  the  process  of  con- 
version. In  this  manner  the  ego  frees  itself  from  opposi- 
tion, the  original  painful  idea  or  unattainable  wish  is  for- 
gotten, and  instead  it  becomes  burdened  with  a  memory 
symbol  which  remains  in  consciousness  as  an  unadjusted 
motor  or  sensory  innervation.  We  thus  see  that  the  main 
character  of  hysteria  is  not  the  splitting  of  consciousness 
as  asserted  by  Janet  and  his  school,  but  the  ability  of  con- 
verting the  sum  of  strangulated  emotion  either  totally  or 
partially,  into  that  motor  or  sensory  innervation  which 
is  more  or  less  connected  with  the  traumatic  event.  In 
brief  the  study  of  the  psychoneuroses  shows  conclusively 
that  there  was  a  failure  in  the  repression  of  the  idea  con- 
cerning the  unattainable  wish.  To  be  sure  the  painful  idea 
is  crowded  out  of  consciousness  and  memory  and  the  indi- 
vidual thus  spares  himself  a  great  deal  of  pain,  but  the 
repressed  wish  remains  in  the  unconscious  and  lurks  for  an 
opportunity  to  become  active.  When  it  succeeds  it  brings 
to  the  surface  a  distorted  and  strange  substitutive  forma- 
tion which  soon  becomes  connected  with  the  same  pain  the 
individual  got  rid  of  through  the  repression.  This  sub- 
stitutive formation  is  the  symptom  and  in  hysteria  it  is 
produced  by  the  process  of  conversion. 

There  are,  however,  predisposed  persons  in  whom  there 


18  PSYCHANALYSIS 

is  no  adaptation  for  conversion.  Here,  if  an  unbearable 
idea  enters  consciousness  it  meets  with  the  same  contrary 
forces  as  those  mentioned  above,  the  affect  becomes  de- 
tached from  the  idea,  but  instead  of  being  converted  into 
the  physical,  it  remains  in  the  psychic  sphere.  The  weak- 
ened unbearable  idea  remains  apart  from  all  association  in 
consciousness,  but  its  detached  affect  or  the  sum  of  excite- 
ment allies  itself  to  another  indifferent  idea,5  which  on 
account  of  this  "false"  connection  becomes  an  obsession; 
or  the  unbearable  idea  is  so  changed  that  the  patient  does 
not  recognize  it.  He  no  longer  thinks  of  the  painful  or 
disagreeable,  but  instead  he  is  burdened  with  an  obsession, 
the  absurdity  of  which  he  realizes,  but  from  which  he  can- 
not rid  himself.  The  advantage  thus  gained  by  the  ego 
in  the  transposition  or  dislocation  of  the  affect  is  not  as 
great  as  in  the  hysterical  conversion  of  psychic  excite- 
ment into  somatic  innervation.  The  affect  remains  un- 
changed and  undiminished,  but  the  unbearable  idea  is 
suppressed  from  memory. 

The  same  mechanism  holds  true  for  the  origin  of  phobias, 
and  both  come  under  the  heading  of  compulsion  neurosis. 
It  was  found  that  the  unbearable  ideas  underlying  the 
compulsion  neurosis  (obsessions,  doubts  and  phobias), 
also  have  their  origin  in  the  sexual  life.  In  the  words  of 
Freud,  "the  obsession  represents  a  compensation  or  sub- 
stitute for  the  unbearable  sexual  idea  and  takes  its  place 
in  consciousness."6 

Both  hysteria  and  compulsion  neurosis  belong  to  the  de- 
fense neuropsychoses;  their  symptoms  originate  through  the 
psychic  mechanism  of  defense,  that  is,  through  the  attempt 
to  repress  a  painful  idea  which  was  incompatible  with  the 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSBS  19 

ego  of  the  patient.  In  both  neuroses  the  idea  is  robbed  of 
its  affect,  and  excluded  from  associative  elaboration,  re- 
maining, however,  in  consciousness. 

There  is  still  another  far  more  forceful  and  more  suc- 
cessful form  of  defense,  wherein  the  ego  misplaces  the 
incompatible  idea  with  its  emotion  and  acts  as  though 
the  painful  idea  had  never  come  to  pass.  When  this 
occurs  the  person  merges  into  a  psychosis  which  may  be 
called  "hallucinatory  confusion."  To  illustrate  this 
form  of  defense  I  will  cite  a  case  which,  through  the 
kindness  of  Dr.  M.  S.  Gregory,  I  saw  in  the  psychopathic 
pavilion  of  Bellevue  Hospital.  It  concerned  a  young 
married  man  of  about  thirty  years,  a  New  Yorker,  who, 
being  out  of  work,  tried  his  fortune  as  a  farm-hand  up  the 
state.  Things  did  not  go  as  smoothly  as  he  expected, 
and  one  day  the  farmer  gave  him  a  rather  severe  thrash- 
ing, and  dismissed  him  without  paying  him  his  salary. 
He  sought  redress,  but  could  get  none  so  that  he  had  to 
walk  to  New  York  City  penniless.  When  he  returned 
home  he  made  a  number  of  attempts  to  obtain  justice 
for  himself,  but  was  told  that  he  could  do  nothing.  He 
kept  on  brooding  over  it  for  some  time,  when  one  day  he 
suddenly  became  excited  and  confused.  He  became 
boisterous,  cursing  the  farmer,  and  accompanied  his 
utterances  by  violently  kicking  the  bedstead  and  the 
pillows.  He  imagined  that  he  was  punching  the  farmer. 
He  was  so  excited  and  confused  that  his  wife  sent  for  the 
police  who  took  him  to  the  psychopathic  pavilion  of 
Bellevue  Hospital. 

Here  the  idea  was  so  painful  that  the  ego  tore  itself 
away  from  it,  but  as  the  painful  idea  was  inseparably 


20  PSYCHANALYSIS 

connected  with  reality  the  ego  had  to  exclude  itself 
wholly  from  reality.  Such  cases  give  us  an  insight  into 
the  psychoses.  Thanks  to  the  genius  of  Freud  and  the 
Zurich  school7  we  no  longer  fear  to  face  the  hitherto 
considered  perplexities  of  the  insane  mind.  As  will  be 
shown  later  every  insane  utterance,  every  morbid  per- 
ception, has  a  definite  meaning  and  a  definite  raison 
d'etre  when  analyzed.  Truly  there  is  method  in  madness. 
In  tracing  the  psychic  traumas  which  are  supposed  to 
be  at  the  basis  of  hysterical  symptoms  or  compulsion 
neuroses,  one  invariably  comes  to  sexual  experiences  of 
childhood.  This  is  so  conspicuous  that  it  led  Freud  to  lay 
great  stress  on  the  sexual  and  to  formulate  the  following 
sentence:  "In  a  normal  vita  sexualis  no  neurosis  is  pos- 
sible."8 This,  I  know,  sounds  rather  strange,  but  I 
would  like  to  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  the  sexual 
impulse  is  one  of  our  strongest  impulses.  It  is  the  one 
impulse  that  is  subjected  to  the  greatest  amount  of 
repression  and  for  that  reason  it  has  always  been  the 
weakest  point  in  our  cultural  development.  It  must 
also  be  borne  in  mind  that  Freud's  conception  of  the  sexual 
is  very  broad.  It  is  just  as  broad  as  our  English  word 
"love"  or  the  Greek  word  "eros,"  and  does  not  at  all  limit 
itself  to  gross  sexuality.  Moreover,  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that  sexuality  is  more  complicated  than  one  thinks. 
Hypocrisy  and  prudishness  have  from  time  immemorial 
tabooed  all  things  sexual;  the  word  itself  carries  with  it 
the  ideas  of  lewdness  and  loathing.  As  a  result  of  this 
the  ignorance  displayed  in  matters  sexual  is  appalling. 
Thus  we  are  led  to  believe  that  there  is  no  sexuality  be- 
fore a  certain  age,  the  age  of  puberty,  yet  when  we  look 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  21 

back  to  our  own  youth  we  find  that  long  before  that  age 
we  were  subjected  to  certain  feelings  which  were  unmistak- 
ably of  a  sexual  nature.  Freud  maintains  that  the  sexual 
is  born  with  us  and  begins  to  manifest  itself  in  infancy.  "It 
seems  certain,"  he  says,  "that  the  newborn  child  brings  with 
it  the  germs  of  sexual  feelings  which  continue  to  develop  for 
some  time  and  then  succumb  to  a  progressive  suppression, 
which  is,  in  turn,  broken  through  by  the  proper  advance  of 
sexual  development  and  which  can  be  checked  by  indi- 
vidual idiosyncrasies."9  He  also  tells  us  that  the  sexual 
impulse  in  man  consists  of  many  components  and  partial 
impulses.  Many  essential  contributions  to  the  sexual 
excitement  are  furnished  by  the  peripheral  excitement 
of  certain  parts  of  the  body,  such  as  the  genitals,  mouth, 
anus  and  bladder  outlets.  All  these  zones  are  active  in 
infancy  and  only  some  of  them  go  to  make  up  the  sexual 
life.  The  first  libidinous  manifestations  are  of  an  auto- 
erotic  character  and  the  sexual  manifestations  displayed 
by  the  child  are  the  almost  universal  infantile  mastur- 
bation which  serves  to  prepare  the  genitals  for  their 
future  functions;  thumbsucking,  according  to  many 
observers,  connects  directly  or  indirectly  with  autoerotic 
sexual  activities.10  I  have  studied  a  number  of  patients 
who  retained  this  autoerotic  sexual  manifestation  until 
late  in  life  and  I  could  definitely  ascertain  that  it  was  a 
sexual  activity  pure  and  simple.  In  a  number  of  cases 
thumbsucking  continued  until  masturbation  started  and 
in  a  few  cases  both  were  practised  together.  I  know  a 
young  widow  of  thirty-five  years  who,  in  spite  of  all  efforts 
to  break  herself  of  the  habit,  sucked  her  thumb  until  she 
married  at  twenty-five  years  and  resumed  it  with  the  be- 


22  PSYCHANALYSIS 

ginning  of  her  widowhood.  She  told  me  she  had  no  diffi- 
culty in  stopping  it  soon  after  marriage,  but  that  it  returned 
a  few  weeks  after  her  husband's  death.  The  anus  and  the 
bladder  outlets  are  also  erogenous  zones  of  infantile  life, 
and  neurotics  often  retain  them  in  later  life.11  Thus  Z., 
twenty  years  old,  had  an  uncontrollable  desire  to  withhold 
his  urine.  He  stated  that  there  was  much  pleasure  in  the 
discomfort  and  that  that  was  the  reason  for  repeating  it. 
His  mother  told  me  that  he  wet  the  bed  to  the  age  of  fifteen, 
and  that  as  a  child  he  would  remain  on  the  chamber  for 
hours  before  he  could  be  made  to  move  his  bowels. 

The  child  at  first  knows  no  other  sexual  object  except 
itself.  It  is  only  in  the  later  stages  of  development  that  it 
finds  its  love  object  from  without. 

Besides  the  erogenous  zones  the  child  shows  those 
components  which  are  designated  as  partial  impulses. 
Among  these  we  have  the  impulse  for  looking  and  show- 
ing and  for  cruelty  which  manifest  themselves  somewhat 
independently  of  the  erogenous  zones  and  later  enter 
into  intimate  relationship  with  the  sexual  life;  but 
along  with  the  erogenous  sexual  activity  they  are  notice- 
able even  in  the  infantile  years  as  separate  and  independ- 
ent strivings.  In  later  life  they  are  repressed  and  sub- 
jected to  the  primacy  of  the  genitals  which  serve  the 
functions  of  procreation.  The  energies  emanating  from 
them  are  then  deflected  from  the  sexual  and  directed  to 
important  social  aims.  This  is  the  so-called  process  of 
sublimation.  Thus,  sublimation  of  the  homosexual  com- 
ponent gives  origin  to  the  psychic  process  of  loathing  and 
morality;  the  sublimation  of  the  infantile  sexual  curiosity 
and  exhibitionism  gives  rise  to  shame,  and  the  sublimation  of 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  23 

the  sadistic  and  masochistic  components  to  disgust,  pity 
and  similar  feelings.  These  reactions  formed  during 
the  sexual  latency  period — from  the  fourth  year  to  the 
beginning  of  puberty,  eleven — make  up  the  character  of 
the  person  and  later  give  us  a  good  indication  of  his  early 
sexual  life.  I  regret  that  I  am  unable  to  discuss  here 
more  fully  the  sexual  theories  expounded  by  Freud; 
those  who  are  interested  in  the  subject  should  study  his 
interesting  and  profound  book,  "The  Three  Contributions 
to  the  Sexual  Theory."  I  will  merely  add  that  after 
carefully  studying  the  sexual  development  in  its  relation 
to  the  normal  and  neurotic  individuals,  Freud  concluded 
that  the  constitutional  sexual  predisposition  of  the  child  is 
"polymorphous-perverse"  in  our  sense,  and  that  from  this 
constitution  the  so-called  normal  behavior  of  the  sexual 
function  results  through  a  repression  of  certain  components. 
The  child  has  no  conception  of  moral  or  esthetic  feelings, 
and  it  is  only  after  the  primitive  impulses  are  repressed 
that  the  normal  being  evolves.  By  referring  to  the  infan- 
tile character  of  sexuality  the  connection  can  be  formed 
between  the  normal  sexuality,  perversions  and  neuroses. 
The  normal  sexuality  results  through  the  repression  of  cer- 
tain partial  impulses  and  components  of  the  infantile  pre- 
disposition and  through  a  subordination  of  the  rest  under 
the  primacy  of  the  genital  zones.  The  perversions  corre- 
spond to  disturbances  of  this  relationship  due  to  a  superior 
compulsive-like  development  of  some  of  the  partial  impulses, 
while  the  neuroses  can  be  traced  to  a  marked  repression  of 
the  libidinous  strivings.  However,  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that  the  symptoms  do  not  by  any  means  result  only 
at  the  expense  of  the  so-called  normal  sexual  impulse  (at 


24  PSYCHANALYSIS 

least,  not  exclusively  or  preponderate^),  but  they  repre- 
sent the  converted  expression  of  impulses  which  might 
be  designated  as  perverse  if  they  could  manifest  them- 
selves directly  in  phantasies  and  acts  without  deviating 
from  consciousness.  The  symptoms  are,  therefore,  par- 
tially formed  at  the  cost  of  abnormal  sexuality.  "The 
neurosis  is,  so  to  say,  the  negative  of  the  perversion."12 

Moreover,  there  is  a  congenital  variation  in  the  sexual 
constitution,  the  existence  of  which  can  naturally  be  es- 
tablished only  through  its  later  manifestations.  It  mani- 
fests itself  in  a  preponderance  of  one  or  another  of  the 
manifold  sources  of  the  sexual  feeling  and  it  must  always 
come  to  expression  in  the  final  result  even  if  it  should 
remain  within  normal  limits.  To  be  sure,  certain  varia- 
tions of  the  original  disposition  even  without  further  aid 
must  necessarily  lead  to  the  formation  of  an  abnormal 
sexual  life.  This  may  be  called  "degenerative"  and 
considered  as  an  expression  of  hereditary  deterioration. 
In  this  connection  Freud  states  that  in  more  than  half 
of  the  severe  cases  of  hysteria,  compulsion  neuroses,  etc., 
treated  by  him  by  psychotherapy  he  positively  succeeded 
in  demonstrating  syphilis  in  their  fathers  before  marriage. 
The  patients  showed  absolutely  no  sign  of  hereditary 
lues,  so  that  the  abnormal  sexual  constitution  was  to  be 
considered  as  the  last  off-shoot  of  the  luetic  heredity. 
In  my  own  cases  I  found  even  less  than  a  third  in  which 
syphilis  could  be  demonstrated  in  parents. 

If  in  the  course  of  development  certain  strong  com- 
ponents experience  a  repression  the  following  result 
takes  place:  the  sexual  excitations  are  produced  as  usual, 
but  are  prevented  from  attaining  then*  aim  by  psychic 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  25 

hindrances  and  are  driven  off  into  many  other  paths  until 
they  express  themselves  in  symptoms.  The  sexual  life 
of  such  persons  begins  like  that  of  perverts.  A  consider- 
able part  of  their  childhood  is  filled  up  with  perverse 
sexual  activity  which  occasionally  extends  far  beyond  the 
period  of  maturity,  but  owing  to  inner  reasons  a  repressive 
change  results  before  or  after  puberty  and  henceforth  there 
appears  a  neurosis  instead  of  a  perversion.  And,  confining 
ourselves  for  the  present  to  hysteria,  it  may  be  said  that 
hysteria  is  the  result  of  a  conflict  between  the  libido  and  the 
sexual  repression,  and  that  the  hysterical  symptoms  have  the 
value  of  a  compromise  between  both  psychic  streams.  We  must 
bear  in  mind  that  it  is  the  mental  conflict  which  is  the 
essential  causative  factor  and  not  the  sexual  factor  as  such. 
The  resultant  compromise  of  such  conflict  generally  causes 
the  sexual  wishes  to  be  consciously  rejected  and  uncon- 
sciously accepted.  The  wish  is  then  repressed,  but  the  sum 
of  excitement  finds  its  way  into  bodily  innervation  and 
forms  the  hysterical  symptom. 
Let  me  cite  an  example. 

A  married  woman  of  forty-nine  years  who  suffered  from  hysteria 
for  more  than  twenty-two  years  showed  as  one  of  her  symptoms  a 
very  painful  contracted  and  paralyzed  right  arm  which  had  been  so 
for  more  than  three  years.  The  muscles  of  the  arm  and  shoulder 
region  were  completely  anesthetic  and  deep  needle  pricks  were  not 
perceived,  but  the  slightest  attempt  to  straighten  out  the  member 
was  most  painful.  Indeed  the  pain  was  the  chief  symptom.  It 
would  be  impossible  for  me  to  give  here  the  full  analysis  of  the 
symptom.     I  will  merely  mention  some  of  the  psychic  constellations. 

Due  to  a  number  of  sexual  traumas  sustained  in  childhood  all  sexual 
feelings  were  repressed  and,  as  a  result,  she  was  totally  frigid  when  she 
was  married.  Indeed,  coitus  was  both  painful  and  disgusting  to  her. 
This  produced  marked  marital  unhappiness.     Her  husband  failed  to 


26  PSYCHANALYSIS 

understand  her  condition,  and  what  made  matters  worse  was  the 
fact  that  he  found  her  masturbating  in  her  sleep.  When  he  first 
noticed  it  he  was  very  indignant  and  tried  to  call  her  to  account  for  it, 
but  she  continued  to  sleep;  he  tried  to  arouse  her,  but  she  did  not 
respond.  He  thought  at  first  that  she  was  shamming,  but  finally 
concluded  that  "she  had  a  fit"  and  reported  the  matter  to  the  family 
physician.  This  somnambulistic  state  during  which  she  masturbated 
was  repeated  on  an  average  of  five  to  six  times  a  week.  There  was 
complete  amnesia  for  this  action.  She  at  first  refused  to  believe  it, 
but  she  was  finally  convinced  of  it  by  her  own  sister,  who  saw  her  do 
it  on  the  occasion  of  sleeping  with  her.  She  then  sought  the  aid  of  a 
physician  who  gave  her  large  doses  of  bromide  and  advised  her  to 
wear  a  sock  over  her  hand  and  firmly  tie  her  arm  in  complete  flexion 
While  she  was  being  treated  for  her  masturbation  it  was  reported  to 
her  that  her  husband  carried  on  some  illicit  relations  with  one  of  the 
girls  she  employed.  She  absolutely  refused  to  believe  this,  and  no 
amount  of  urging  on  the  part  of  her  husband's  own  relatives  could 
induce  her  to  dismiss  this  girl.  The  latter  was  the  daughter  of  a  very 
poor  woman,  and  it  was  out  of  compassion  that  she  took  her  into  her 
millinery  establishment  and  taught  her  the  profession.  This  state  of 
affairs  continued  for  months.  She  was  extremely  jealous,  yet  her 
pride  would  not  allow  her  to  take  any  action  in  the  matter.  It  was 
after  a  quarrel  about  some  other  matters,  during  which  her  husband 
grasped  her  by  the  right  arm,  that  it  became  painful  and  developed 
into  the  condition  noted  above.  As  she  was  the  moving  spirit  in  the 
millinery  establishment  the  business  had  to  be  given  up,  as  she  was 
totally  incapacitated  by  her  malady. 

Here  we  see  the  conflict  was  between  the  libido  and  the 
repression.  The  repressed  sexual  feelings  made  her  con- 
sciously frigid,  but  unconsciously  passionate.  When 
her  masturbation  was  brought  to  her  consciousness  she 
took  all  the  precautions  to. prevent  it,  but  as  usual  she 
was  unsuccessful.  Her  husband's  faithlessness  gave  rise 
to  another  conflict.  Her  pride  gained  the  upper  hand 
and  she  absolutely  refused  to  believe  what  everyone  else 
saw  and  what  she  herself  could  not  fail  to  see.     When 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  27 

her  husband  grasped  her  by  this  arm,  which  was  the 
cause  of  so  much  mental  pain — it  was  the  one  with  which 
she  masturbated — the  conversion  took  place.  The  symp- 
tom, as  Freud  puts  it,  was  the  result  of  a  compromise 
between  two  opposing  affects,  one  of  which  strove  to 
bring  to  a  realization  a  partial  impulse  or  a  component 
of  the  sexual  constitution,  while  the  other  strove  to  sup- 
press the  same.13  This  symptom,  as  we  see,  served  a 
double  purpose.  It  stopped  the  masturbation  and  inca- 
pacitated her  to  such  an  extent  that  her  business  had  to  be 
given  up  and  the  girl  who  caused  her  so  many  pangs  had 
to  go.  The  pain  was  also  the  punishment  for  the  under- 
lying sexual  desire.  She  never  masturbated  with  her 
left  hand,  nor  has  she  ever  been  seen  masturbating  since 
she  was  cured  by  psychanalysis. 

In  analyzing  neurotic  symptoms  Freud  found  that  the 
dream  played  a  great  part  in  the  individual's  life.  This 
gave  origin  to  the  epoch-making  book,  "The  Interpretation 
of  Dreams."*  The  dream  is  not  at  all  absurd  and  sense- 
less, but  has  a  definite  meaning  when  analyzed,  and  in 
the  experienced  hand  it  is  the  most  valuable  instrument 
for  penetrating  the  mind.  In  the  neurotic  patient  the 
subject  of  the  dream  generally  refers  to  the  origin  of  the 
neurosis,  i.e.,  to  the  repressed  material,  but  because  of  the 
many  distortions  and  transformations  only  few  and  hid- 
den associations  show  allusions  to  the  repressed  experi- 
ence. Psychanalysis  explains  the  different  components 
of  the  dream  and  thus  reveals  the  repressed  ideas  which 
are  at  the  basis  of  the  neurosis.     The  dream  is  divided 

*  Translated  by  A.  A.  Brill.  George  Allen,  London,  and  the  Mac- 
millan  Co.,  New  York. 


28  PSYCHANALYSIS 

into  the  manifest  and  latent  thoughts.  The  former  are 
remembered  by  the  dreamer  on  awakening,  while  the 
latter  represent  the  thoughts  of  the  dream  before  they 
were  subjected  to  the  distortion.  When  the  translation 
is  complete  we  find  that  the  latent  thoughts  of  the  dream 
contain  the  fulfilment  of  a  repressed  wish.14  The  same 
holds  true  in  the  psychoneurotic  symptoms.  In  the 
words  of  Freud," The  hysterical  symptom,  like  all  other 
psychic  formations,  is  the  expression  of  a  wish  f  ulnlment." 15 
In  the  same  way  the  repression  continues  to  evince 
itself  in  normal  conscious  life;  in  other  words,  the  wish 
fulfilment  normally  manifests  itself  during  the  waking 
state  just  as  it  does  in  the  dream  and  in  the  neurotic 
symptoms.  This  can  be  seen  readily  if  we  analyze  the 
abnormal  or  the  so-called  accidental  actions  of  every-day 
life.  In  his  very  interesting  and  instructive  book,  "Psycho- 
pathology  of  Every  Day  Life,"16  Freud  shows  that  mere 
lapses  of  memory,  speech  and  writing,  as  well  as  the  com- 
mon mistakes,  are  not  at  all  accidental,  but  when  analyzed 
have  a  reason.  Thus,  the  forgetting  of  a  name  which  we 
have  once  known  implies  that  either  directly  or  indirectly 
there  is  something  painful  or  disagreeable  connected  with  it. 
A  mistake  in  talking  usually  reveals  the  speaker's  real  mean- 
ing. In  other  words,  the  repression  influences  our  waking 
state  just  as  it  does  the  dream  and  the  psychoneurotic 
symptoms.  Just  as  the  latent  thought  of  the  dream,  the 
psychoneurotic  symptom  represents  a  fulfilled  wish,  and 
both  the  dream  and  the  neurosis  seem  incomprehensible 
until  explained  by  psychanalysis.  To  illustrate  how  com- 
plex some  of  these  mechanisms  are  I  will  cite  a  brief  analysis 
of  an  obsession. 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  29 

One  of  my  patients,  a  young  man  twenty-six  years  old,  suffered  from 
a  typical  compulsion  neurosis,  the  main  symptom  being  an  obsessive 
action  which  consisted  in  a  rapid  upward  movement  of  his  arms,  as 
though  holding  back  or  pushing  up  something.  This  action  became 
very  annoying  to  him  and  his  family.  He  was  often  compelled  to  do 
it  in  public,  and  it  interfered  with  his  work  as  a  diamond  cutter.  Be- 
fore proceeding  with  the  analysis  I  will  mention  something  concerning 
the  technique. 

On  analyzing  psychoneurotic  symptoms  the  patient  is 
required  to  lie  on  his  back  on  a  lounge  and  the  physician 
sits  behind  the  patient's  head  at  the  head  of  the  lounge. 
The  object  of  this  position  is  to  avoid  all  muscular  exertion 
and  distraction,  thus  allowing  a  thorough  concentration 
of  attention  on  the  patient's  own  psychic  activities.  In 
my  experience  the  same  purpose  can  be  accomplished  with 
the  patient  sitting  in  front  of  you  in  a  comfortable  chair. 
We  then  ask  the  patient  to  tell  all  he  knows  of  the  symptom 
and  we  usually  find  a  number  of  memory  gaps.  These 
he  is  urged  to  fill  in  by  concentration  of  attention  on  the 
subject  and  by  repeating  all  thoughts  originating  in  this 
connection.  Before  proceeding  we  must  have  the  pa- 
tient's promise  that  he  will  frankly  repeat  to  us  all  the 
thoughts  occurring  to  him  in  the  order  of  their  sequence, 
even  thoughts  that  are  painful  or  embarrassing.  This  is 
Freud's  method  of  free  association.  We  are  also  alive  to 
the  fact  that  the  psychoneurotic  symptom  is  often  a 
symbolic  expression  of  the  original  repressed  thoughts  and 
we  therefore  resort  to  Freud's  method  of  interpretation, 
that  is,  we  look  for  symbolic  expressions,  psychopatholog- 
ical  actions  and  make  use  of  the  analysis  of  dreams.  For 
unless  one  has  mastered  the  triad  of  Freud's  psychology, 
"The  Three  Contributions  to  the  Sexual  Theory,"  "Psycho- 


30  PSYCHANALYSIS 

pathology  of  Every  Day  Life,"  and  "The  Interpretation  of 
Dreams,"  lie  is  unable  to  use  or  judge  Freud's  psychanalytic 
method.  With  this  digression  we  will  now  return  to  our 
patient. 

On  being  questioned  concerning  his  obsessive  action  it  was  found 
that  it  concealed  the  obsessive  thought  "God  may  get  into  me."  This 
thought  obsessed  him  for  months,  and  realizing  the  absurdity  of  it, 
he  was  ashamed  to  tell  it  to  anybody.  This  was  then  followed  by  the 
obsessive  action  described  above  which  was  a  protective  mechanism 
against  the  thought  and  signified  "I  will  pull  Him  out  again."  As 
the  word  "  God  "  seemed  to  be  the  most  important  word  in  the  obses- 
sion I  asked  him  to  concentrate  his  mind  on  this  word  and  tell  me  all 
the  associations  it  recalled  to  him.  He  gave  the  following:  "  God — 
father — I  am  always  bothered  by  the  foolish  thought  that  God  will 
get  into  me."  He  suddenly  stopped  and  on  being  urged  to  continue  he 
said  that  something  just  occurred  to  him  which  had  nothing  to  do  with 
the  thought  of  God  and  which  he  would  not  like  to  tell  unless  it  was 
absolutely  necessary.  On  being  told  to  continue  he  stated  that  it 
recalled  to  him  that  about  six  months  ago  while  being  at  work  a 
fellow  workingman  once  asked  him  to  look  out  of  the  window  and 
when  he  did  so  he  saw  two  dogs  in  the  act  of  copulation.  This  was 
very  embarrassing  to  him.  He  turned  his  eyes  away  from  the  scene, 
but  he  could  not  banish  a  number  of  fancies  which  then  came  to  his 
mind.  One  thought  was  "How  would  it  be  to  get  into  the  dog?" 
He  soon  repressed  these  thoughts  and  kept  on  repeating  to  himself 
"I  will  not  get  into  the  dog,  the  dog  may  get  into  me."  Now  if  the 
word  dog  is  read  backward  you  will  find  that  it  spells  God  and  gives  the 
key  to  the  whole  obsession. 

For  years  this  patient  was  in  the  habit  of  turning  words  about. 
He  showed  me  a  diary,  which  was  filled  with  mirror  writing  which  he 
used  because  he  did  not  want  anyone  in  the  house  to  know  his  affairs. 
We  note  that  he  at  first  consciously  changed  the  idea  "to  get  into  the 
dog"  into  "the  dog  may  get  into  me,"  and  as  the  idea  was  disagreeable 
it  was  repressed  and  the  word  "dog"  was  then  unconsciously  changed 
into  God.     This  completed  the  obsession.* 

*  For  detailed  description  of  compulsion  neurosis  see  Chapter  IV. 


THE    PSYCHONEUROSES  31 

As  will  be  shown  later  the  same  mechanisms  are  found 
in  the  dream,  in  the  neologisms  of  the  insane  and  in  the 
normal.  I  am  sure  that  the  majority  of  my  readers  are 
aware  of  the  fact  that  the  Sesrun  Club  is  the  nurses'  club, 
but  perhaps  few  know  that  the  Yvel  Jewelry  company  is 
the  Levy  Jewelry  company.  The  basis  of  both  crypto- 
gram is  a  painful  idea.  Nurses'  Club  neither  looks  nor 
sounds  as  dignified  as  Sesrun  Club,  which  may  pass  as  a 
millionaires'  organization,  and  the  Yvel  Jewelry  company 
looks  better  and  is  perhaps  more  profitable  than  would 
be  the  Levy  Jewelry  company. 

This  is  a  very  simple  example  of  the  psychanalysis  of 
an  obsession,  perhaps  too  simple  to  impress  some  of  you 
with  the  gravity  of  the  work,  but  we  cannot  change  the 
workings  of  the  mind.  Those  who  analyze  psychoneurotic 
symptoms  and  the  utterances  of  the  insane  can  always 
find  such  mechanisms.  Do  not,  however,  think  that  the 
analyses  of  this  obsession  and  the  afore-described  hyster- 
ical paralysis  were  as  simple  as  I  presented  them.  I 
merely  give  you  the  result  obtained  after  weeks  and 
months  of  painstaking  work.  It  would  have  been  impos- 
sible to  give  here  the  full  analysis  of  any  of  the  cases,  as 
an  entire  volume  would  be  required  for  a  detailed  account 
of  any  one.  Indeed,  psychanalysis  takes  time;  the 
treatment  of  a  chronic  case  usually  takes  from  six  months 
to  a  few  years,  but  the  most  refractory  chronic  cases  have 
been  cured  by  this  treatment.  Both  cases  mentioned 
were  cured  by  psychanalysis  after  everything  else  was 
tried  in  vain. 

Lest  there  should  be  some  misunderstanding  about 
the  facility  of  the  psychanalytic  treatment  and  in  order 


32  PSYCHANALYSIS 

to  demonstrate  how  we  actually  work  I  shall  next  confine 
myself  to  the  discussion  of  the  theory  of  dreams. 

References 

1.  Freud:  Selected  Papers  on  Hysteria  and  Other  Psyche-neuroses, 
p.  2,  Trans,  by  A.  A.  Brill,  Monograph  Series  Mental  and  Nervous 
Dis.  Pub.  Co.,  2d  Ed. 

2.  L.  c,  p.  5. 

3.  Freud:  Ueber  Psychoanalyse,  Deuticke,  Wien,  1910. 

4.  Freud:  Selected  Papers,  p.  87. 

5.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  125. 

6.  L.  c,  p.  126. 

7.  Cf.  Chap.  VI. 

8.  Selected  Papers,  p.  188. 

9.  Freud :  Three  Contributions  to  the  Sexual  Theory,  p.  38.  Trans. 
by  A.  A.  Brill,  Monograph  Series. 

10.  Cf.  Holt,  Diseases  of  Infancy  and  Childhood,  p.  739,  Second 
Edition. 

11.  Cf.  Chap.  XIII. 

12.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  27.     See  also  Chapter  IV. 

13.  Selected  Papers,  p.  198. 

14.  Cf.  Chap.  II. 

15.  Freud:  L.  c,  197. 

16.  Freud:  Psychopathology  of  Every  Day  Life.  Trans,  by  A.  A. 
Brill,  T.  Fisher  Unwin,  London. 


CHAPTER  II 
DREAMS 

Their  Structure  and  Mechanism,  Technique  of  Interpreta- 
tion, Symbolism  and  their  Relation  to  the 
Neuroses  and  Psychoses 

"  Der  miide  Gebundene  der  in  Fesseln  liegt  kann  nicht 
erwachen,  der  miide  Gebundene  trdumt  von  Freiheit." — ■ 
Hauptmann. 

From  time  immemorial  the  dream  has  been  the  subject 
of  much  interest  and  speculation.  Since  the  early  Greek 
period  numerous  theories  have  been  propounded  and 
entertained  in  the  realms  of  religion  and  of  science,  but 
not  until  within  recent  years  has  investigation  of  the 
dream  proceeded  on  a  true  psychological  basis.  It 
would  be  superfluous  and  quite  impossible  to  review 
here  the  many  curious  theories  held  at  different 
epochs  in  the  world's  history  concerning  the  dream; 
suffice  it  to  say  that  ancients  and  moderns  differ  very 
little  in  their  views.  The  ancient  Greeks  believed  that 
the  dream  was  an  inspiration  of  the  gods,  that  it  was 
simply  a  warning  or  prophecy  of  things  to  come  and  hence 
always  gave  credence  to  it.  Kindred  thoughts  are  ex- 
pressed in  the  Bible.  Joseph  interpreted  all  dreams  as 
a  foreboding  of  the  future,  "what  God  is  about  to  do  he 

showeth    unto    Pharoah;"    and    as   the   Scriptures    inform 
3  33 


34  PSYCHANALYSIS 

us  steps  were  immediately  taken  to  prepare  for  the  ap- 
proaching famine.  These  views  have  come  down  to  us 
traditionally  and  disregarding  here  the  numerous  scien- 
tific and  pseudoscientific  theories,  we  may  say  that  the 
present  popular  belief  in  dreams  differs  in  no  wise  from 
that  of  the  classical  Greeks  and  the  ancient  Egyptians. 
Every  race  and  religion  still  looks  upon  the  dream  as 
something  supernatural  and  objective,  as  an  inspiration 
coming  from  above;  and  the  laity  still  continues  to  believe 
in  its  importance.  The  gambler  dreams  his  horses  or  lot- 
tery numbers,  the  Indian  medicine  man  dreams  his  reme- 
dies, and  not  seldom  we  hear  even  of  "dreams  coming  true." 
Modern  psychology  has  continued  the  work  of  ancient 
writers  and  as  a  result  we  have  numerous  valuable  con- 
tributions to  the  problem  of  the  dream;  numerous  at- 
tempts have  been  made  to  show  the  relation  of  the  dream 
to  normal  and  abnormal  life,1  but  so  far  as  I  know  no 
author  has  solved  the  problem  of  the  dream  so  ingeniously 
and  successfully  as  Professor  Freud.2  As  mentioned 
previously  in  developing  his  psychology  of  the  psycho- 
neuroses,  Freud  found  that  the  dream  plays  a  very  impor- 
tant part  in  the  psyche  of  the  individual.  The  dream 
is  not  a  senseless  jumble,  but  a  perfect  mechanism  and 
when  analyzed  it  is  found  to  contain  the  fulfilment  of  a 
wish;  it  always  treats  of  the  inmost  thoughts  of  person- 
ality and  for  that  reason  gives  us  the  best  access  to  the 
unconscious.  No  psychanalysis  is  complete,  nay  pos- 
sible, without  the  analysis  of  dreams.  The  dream  not 
only  helps  us  to  interpret  symptoms,  but  is  often  an 
invaluable  instrument  in  diagnosis  and  treatment.  The 
causative  factors  of  many  neuroses  are  extremely  vague 


DREAMS  35 

and  usually  unconscious  to  the  patient,  and  it  is  by  means 
of  the  dream  that  the  underlying  etiological  factors  are 
disclosed. 

In  order  to  understand  the  mechanism  of  dreams  it 
will  be  necessary  to  bear  in  mind  Freud's  conception  of 
repression.3  To  forget  is  a  part  of  human  nature;  this 
is  so  obvious  that  we  never  even  stop  to  think  about  it. 
Yet  when  we  examine  the  things  forgotten  we  soon  find 
that  there  is  a  method  in  forgetting;  our  forgetting  seems 
to  follow  a  kind  of  selection.  It  was  Freud  who  first 
called  attention  to  the  motives  of  forgetting.  If  we  ex- 
clude organic  brain  disturbances,  we  find  that  we  are 
most  apt  to  forget  painful  or  disagreeable  impressions. 
This  forgetting,  as  everyone  knows,  is  purposeful  and 
desired.  The  individual  strives  at  all  times  to  rid  him- 
self of  the  unbearable  either  by  settling  the  situation  in 
question  when  possible  or  by  directly  crowding  it  out  of 
his  mind.  When  we  meet  with  mishaps  or  failures  to 
which  we  cannot  adequately  react,  we  grieve  over  them 
for  a  time  and  then  make  desperate  efforts  to  forget  them 
— that  is,  we  repress  them.  Moreover,  the  phantasies 
which  are  common  to  both  normal  and  abnormal  persons 
may  be  of  a  disagreeable  nature  or  present  an  unattain- 
able object  and  may  therefore  be  repressed.  It  often 
happens  that  such  phantasies  are  repressed  before  they 
are  really  grasped  by  full  consciousness.  The  repressed 
material,  or,  in  the  language  of  Jung,  the  complexes  are 
pushed  into  the  unconscious  and  there  they  remain  in  a 
dormant  state.4  Now  and  then  they  are  recalled  by  some 
association,  but  like  disturbed  ghosts  they  soon  return 
to  their  resting  place.     Jung  has  likewise  shown  that  they 


36  PSTCHANALYSIS 

can  be  artificially  evoked.  In  this  country  this  has  also 
been  corroborated  by  many  observers.  The  repression 
is  not,  however,  always  successful,  and  as  I  shall  show 
later  a  splitting  of  consciousness  may  result.  The  re- 
pressed complexes  then  strive  for  manifestation  and  the 
resultant  psychic  conflict  may  produce  a  psychosis  or 
neurosis.  In  brief,  both  normal  and  neurotic  individuals 
possess  a  certain  amount  of  repression.  In  the  former 
this  usually  remains  inert,  manifesting  itself  only  now  and 
then  in  psychopathological  actions5  or  dreams,  while  in 
the  latter  it  forms  in  addition  the  symptoms  of  the  neu- 
rosis or  psychosis.6  But  no  matter  in  what  form  the 
repression  comes  to  the  surface — whether  in  the  form  of 
dreams,  in  psychoneurotic  symptoms,  or  in  the  utter- 
ances or  other  manifestations  of  the  insane — it  is  always  so 
distorted  as  to  be  unrecognizable  to  the  individual. 

What  causes  this  distortion?  When  we  examine  the 
literature  of  the  past  and  present  we  observe  that  writers 
frequently  resort  to  all  sorts  of  detours,  euphemisms  and 
symbolisms  when  they  wish  to  express  something  which 
would  sound  either  harsh  or  objectionable  to  polite  society. 
Thus  we  find  that  the  words  "thigh"  and  "staff"  are 
often  used  in  the  Bible  to  express  that  part  which  repre- 
sents the  male*  and  nowadays  journalism  makes  use  of 
exactly  the  same  devices.  Witness  the  cartoons  and 
jokes  in  the  daily  papers.7  We  all  know  that  many  of  the 
jokes  of  our  best  comedians  would  be  considered  extremely 
offensive  if  direct  expression  were  given  to  their  underlying 
thoughts.  The  reason  why  such  mechanisms  are  neces- 
sary is  quite  obvious.     It  is  the  fear  of  the  censor.     We 

*  See  Genesis  xxiv,  2,  and  lxvii,  29;  Hebrews  xi,  21. 


DREAMS  37 

all  know  what  would  happen  to  the  comedian  who, 
instead  of  uttering  some  innocent  quibble  as  "Willie  Rose 
rose  because  he  sat  on  a  pin"  would  venture  to  give  the 
bare  underlying  thought.  This  censor  has  been  estab- 
lished by  society  for  its  own  protection  and  the  stricter 
the  censor  the  more  concealed  and  funnier  are  the  means 
of  representation.  In  the  same  way  the  distortions  in 
the  dream  and  in  psychotic  symptoms  are  the  work  of 
the  psychic  censor.  This,  too,  is  a  protective  mechanism 
for  the  good  of  the  organism. 

The  formation  of  dreams  is  brought  about  by  the 
working  of  the  two  psychic  forces  (streams  or  systems), 
one  of  which  forms  the  wish  of  the  dream,  while  the  other 
exerts  its  censorship  on  this  wish  and  thus  produces  the 
distortion.  The  reason  for  our  belief  in  this  second 
psychic  force  possessing  the  power  of  censoring  is  as 
follows :  The  latent  thoughts  of  the  dream  are  not  known 
untO  the  dream  has  been  subjected  to  analysis.  What 
we  remember  on  awakening  are  the  manifest  contents 
of  the  dream  emanating  from  the  former.  We  can  there- 
fore assume  that  the  admission  to  consciousness  is  the 
prerogative  of  the  second  psychic  system.  Nothing  from 
the  first  system  can  reach  consciousness  without  having 
passed  through  the  second  system,  and  the  latter  allows 
nothing  to  pass  without  exercising  its  prerogative  of 
censoring.  At  the  point  of  transition  between  the  two 
systems  we  have  the  psychic  censor,  which  after  exercising 
its  function  allows  to  pass  only  that  which  is  agreeable  to 
it  and  restrains  everything  else.  Whatever  is  rejected 
by  the  censor  is  in  a  state  of  repression.  As  will  be  shown 
this  psychic  censor  is  nothing  but  the  inhibitions  formed 


38  PSYCHANALYSIS 

throughout  our  whole  life  by  our  religious  and  ethical 
training. 

As  mentioned  before  the  dream  is  divided  into  the 
manifest  and  the  latent  dream  contents.  The  former 
comprise  all  the  delusive  sensory  impressions  which  are 
recalled  by  the  dreamer  on  awakening;  while  the  latter 
comprise  the  fundamental  thoughts  of  the  dream  as  they 
existed  before  being  subjected  to  the  distortion  of  the 
psychic  censor.  The  manifest  content  of  the  dream 
seems  absurd  and  incoherent,  but  by  psychanalysis  it 
can  readily  be  translated  into  the  latent  thoughts,  which 
always  show  the  fulfilment  of  a  wish. 

When  we  watch  the  development  of  a  human  being 
especially  during  the  first  few  years  of  its  existence,  we 
are  particularly  impressed  with  one  fact,  to  wit:  that  the 
child  is  insatiable  in  its  desires.  As  soon  as  the  child 
sees  the  light  of  this  world  it  makes  known  its  wants  and 
as  soon  as  it  grows  older  they  become  proportionately 
greater.  At  first  these  desires  are  purely  primitive,  but 
with  advancing  age  they  become  more  complicated. 
Thus  a  child  of  a  few  days  old  cries  when  hungry  or  un- 
comfortable, while  at  a  later  age  it  may  cry  because  it  is 
not  rocked  to  sleep  or  because  it  is  not  allowed  to  suck 
its  thumb.  Here  we  no  longer  deal  with  necessary  wants, 
but  with  pleasurable  desires;  for  the  child  could  fall 
asleep  without  being  rocked  and  should  get  along  without 
thumbsucking.  When  we  observe  a  child  at  about  the 
age  of  two,  or  at  an  older  age,  we  can  clearly  see  that  it  is 
a  constant  pleasure  seeker.  All  its  activities  are  directed 
toward  the  realization  of  both  necessary  and  pleasurable 
desires,   especially   the  latter,   and  the  older  the  child 


DREAMS  39 

becomes  the  more  it  wants.  It  would  be  no  exaggeration 
to  assume  that  if  this  condition  were  allowed  to  continue, 
the  whole  world  would  be  too  small  to  supply  the  wants 
of  a  single  individual.  This  idea  is  very  well  expressed 
in  a  pretty  fable  which  I  read  years  ago,  I  believe  in  Socin's 
Arabic  Grammar.  The  story  tells  that  Alexander  of 
Macedon,  while  traveling  after  his  numerous  victories, 
one  day  came  unexpectedly  to  a  strange  place.  He 
wanted  to  enter,  but  the  door  was  locked.  He  knocked 
on  the  door  and  asked  to  be  admitted.  After  being  ignored 
for  some  time  he  was  finally  told  that  he  was  at  the 
door  of  Paradise  and  that  no  mortal  could  enter  there. 
"But  I  am  Alexander  the  Great/'  he  remonstrated. 
"At  least  give  me  some  memento  that  I  may  be  able  to 
say  I  was  here."  A  hand  was  extended  through  the 
door  and  gave  him  a  human  eye.  Alexander  was  cha- 
grined and  baffled.  He  could  not  understand  the  signifi- 
cance of  the  souvenir.  In  his  distress  he  appealed  to 
the  wise  men  of  his  entourage  and  after  considerable 
study  and  rumination  one  of  these — the  wisest  of  them 
all — undertook  to  solve  the  riddle.  He  ordered  that  a 
scale  be  brought  and  he  placed  the  eye  upon  one  side  of 
it.  He  placed  Alexander's  jewels  upon  the  other.  The 
eye  was  heavier.  More  gold  and  jewels  were  placed  on 
the  other  side,  but  the  eye  still  outweighed  the  valuables. 
To  the  surprise  and  consternation  of  Alexander  the  Great 
no  amount  of  precious  stones  or  gold  was  heavy  enough 
to  counterbalance  the  eye.  The  scale  containing  it  bore 
down  steadily.  The  wise  man  thereupon  covered  the 
eye  with  some  earth  and,  behold!  the  scales  turned.  The 
eye  balanced  no  more  than  its  actual  weight.   The  explana- 


40  PSYCHANALYSIS 

tion  by  the  wise  man  was  as  follows:  the  eye  uncovered 
signifies  the  living  eye,  the  covered  eye  signifies  one  dead. 
While  man  lives  he  is  insatiable;  the  more  the  eye  sees 
the  more  it  desires.  Once  it  is  covered  with  earth  it  has 
no  need  of  anything.  This  souvenir  was  therefore  in- 
tended as  a  rebuke  to  Alexander's  unbridled  ambition. 
That  this  moral  lesson  left  little  impression  on  the  insa- 
tiable conqueror  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  he  died  of  his 
insane  excesses  at  the  early  age  of  thirty-two  years. 

To-day  there  are  no  more  worlds  to  conquer,  but  we 
are  all  Alexanders,  none  the  less.  Each  of  us  who  is  not 
afflicted  with  the  emotional  deterioration  of  the  Schizo- 
phrenic is  dominated  by  ambitions  and  is  never  perfectly 
contented.  And  were  it  not  for  the  severe  checking  the 
individual  constantly  experiences  from  the  very  begin- 
ning of  his  childhood,  which  causes  him  to  give  up  most  of 
his  desires,  it  would  be  impossible  to  live  in  any  society, 
savage  or  enlightened. 

This  inhibiting  process  begins  in  childhood  and  is  con- 
tinued throughout  life.  Thus  a  child  of  fifteen  months 
cries  for  a  bird  kept  by  her  parents  as  a  pet.  She  is  not 
satisfied  with  merely  looking  at  it  and  hearing  it  sing, 
but  she  wants  to  touch  and  handle  it.  As  this  would  be 
detrimental  to  the  well  being  of  the  bird  she  is  made  to 
forego  this  pleasure  in  spite  of  her  bitter  crying.  A  little 
girl  of  four  years  wants  toys  belonging  to  other  children. 
She  is  very  unhappy  and  irritable  because  she  cannot 
get  them,  but  with  her  mother's  help,  she  finally  abandons 
this  desire.  At  an  earlier  age  this  same  child  uncere- 
moniously appropriated  other  children's  toys  and  it  was 
only  after  being  punished  that  she  desisted  from  this 


DREAMS  41 

highway  robbery  and  developed  the  sense  of  property. 
So,  throughout  the  whole  course  of  our  existence,  society 
(religion  and  ethics)  teaches  us  to  curb  our  desires  and 
to  give  up  what  we  want.  We  want  much  and  we  get 
comparatively  little,  but  we  never  stop  wanting. 

When  we  try  to  examine  how  children  learn  to  give  up 
their  desires  we  are  soon  struck  by  the  fact  that  they 
never  really  give  up  anything  entirely.  A  girl  of  four 
years  after  being  told  by  her  mother  that  she  cannot  get 
a  certain  toy  which  she  saw  in  the  hand  of  another 
child,  brooded  over  it  for  a  while  and  then  drew  on  the 
sidewalk  with  chalk  what  she  thought  was  a  picture  of 
this  toy  and  played  with  it  as  though  it  were  the  real  toy. 
The  little  girl  of  fifteen  months  forgets  the  bird  and  is 
always  appeased  when  she  gets  a  wooden  bird  or  a  picture 
book  of  birds.  You  all  know  how  boys  ride  on  sticks  for 
want  of  horses  and  that  nearly  all  the  games  played  by 
children  represent  unattainable  desires.  Nor  do  we 
see  those  actions  only  in  early  life  when  the  child  cannot 
differentiate  between  fiction  and  reality.  If  we  continue 
to  observe  we  find  that  these  same  children  as  they  grow 
older  and  know  that  a  stick  is  not  a  horse  and  that  a 
drawing  of  a  toy  is  not  a  real  toy,  nevertheless  still  attain 
what  they  want.  Thus  a  little  boy  goes  to  the  Zoological 
garden  where  he  sees  tigers.  He  remarks  that  he  would 
like  to  have  a  few  tigers.  His  father  laughs  at  him  and 
points  out  that  he  would  have  no  room  for  them  if  he  had 
them.  The  boy  then  dreams  that  he  had  five  little  tigers 
in  a  bird  cage  hanging  in  his  room.  All  this  goes  to  show 
that  the  human  mind  possesses  the  faculty  of  overcoming 
difficulties  and  attains  its  desires  in  spite  of  the  obstacles 


42  PSYCHANALYSIS 

raised  by  nature  and  society.  This  is  Prof.  Freud's 
theory  of  wish  fulfilment.  In  brief  this  theory  states  that 
whatever  is  denied  us  in  reality  we  can  nevertheless 
realize  in  some  other  way.  In  his  sleep  the  poor  man 
has  much  money,  the  prisoner  his  freedom;  the  lame  man 
runs  races,  and  the  ambitious  man  sees  himself  at  the  goal 
of  his  ambition.  In  other  words,  the  dream  represents 
the  realization  of  a  wish;  its  motive  is  a  wish. 

In  this  respect  dreams  are  divided  into  three  classes: 
1.  Those  which  represent  an  unrepressed  wish  as  fulfilled, 
as  seen  in  the  so-called  convenience  dream  and  in  chil- 
dren's dreams.  For  example,  we  often  dream  of  enjoying 
cold  fresh  water  after  a  supper  of  sardines,  olives  or  other 
salty  food.  The  thirst  incites  the  dream  which  tries  to 
appease  the  sleeper  so  as  to  avoid  disturbance  of  sleep. 
A  boy  of  five  dreams  of  finding  pennies  and  nickels  and 
on  awakening  expresses  his  disappointment  by  crying  for 
his  money.  A  little  girl  of  four  dreams  of  chocolate 
almonds  and  on  awakening  insists  that  someone  has 
taken  her  "big  box  of  chocolate  almonds."  2.  Those 
which  represent  the  realization  of  a  repressed  wish  in  an 
entirely  concealed  form,  examples  of  which  I  shall  give 
later.  3.  Those  which  represent  the  realization  of  a 
repressed  wish  in  a  form  insufficiently  or  only  partially 
concealed.  The  last  group  of  dreams  is  generally  accom- 
panied by  fear,  which  interrupts  the  dream  and  takes 
the  place  of  the  distortion  found  in  the  second  group.  Dreams 
accompanied  by  fear  are  of  a  sexual  nature;  the  ideation 
causing  the  fear  in  the  dream  was  once  a  wish  which  was 
later    subjected   to    repression.8    There    are   some   dreams 


DREAMS  43 

of  a  painful  nature  which  are  not,  however,  perceived  as  such 
by  the  dreamer.  These  merely  show  the  insignificance  and 
lack  of  psychic  validity  of  the  dream.  In  these  cases  analysis 
always  shows  that  we  deal  with  the  hidden  fulfilment  of  a  re- 
pressed wish.  Thus,  one  of  my  patients  dreamed  that  she 
saw  her  oldest  boy  laid  out  in  a  casket,  and  yet  she  was  totally 
unconcerned  about  it.  Having  been  told  previously  that  a 
dream  represents  the  fulfilment  of  a  wish  she  now  insisted 
that  this  theory  must  be  wrong,  as  she  would  never  enter- 
tain any  such  wish  regarding  her  boy.  Psychanalysis, 
however,  revealed  the  following  facts:  her  husband  had 
died  and  left  her  with  two  children;  she  had  then  married 
a  widower  with  two  children.  They  are  very  happy, 
but  as  they  already  have  four  children  they  cannot  afford 
to  rear  any  more.  She  has  frequently  expressed  the  wish 
"to  have  an  offspring  as  the  result  of  her  second  mar- 
riage, as  it  would  strengthen  the  union,  but  having  four 
children  in  the  family,  this  is  out  of  the  question."  The 
dream  fulfils  her  wish  by  showing  her  that  there  are  only 
three  children  in  the  family.  A  man  of  thirty  dreamed 
that  he  saw  his  brother's  head  split  open  and  bleeding 
and  was  not  at  all  worried  about  it.  He,  too,  objected 
to  the  theory  of  wish  fulfilment.  Analysis  showed  that 
he  referred  to  his  brother  M.,aboy  of  sixteen  years,  whom 
he  had  thought  incorrigible.  He  had  read  recently  an 
article  in  a  Sunday  newspaper  saying  that  bad  boys  could 
be  cured  by  trephining  the  skull  and  exposing  the  brain — 
which  at  once  caused  him  to  think  of  his  brother.  The 
dream  realized  his  wish  by  showing  him  his  brother  with 
his  brain  exposed. 

Recently  a  patient  came  to  me  and  disputed  the  theory 


44  PSYCHANALYSIS 

of  wish  fulfilment.  To  prove  his  assertion  he  stated  that 
the  night  before  he  had  dreamed  that  he  had  syphilis. 
I  could  readily  prove  that  the  dream  showed  the  realiza- 
tion of  a  wish.  This  patient  was  being  treated  by  me  for 
psychosexual  impotence  and  the  day  before  his  dream  we 
discussed  promiscuous  sexuality.  I  called  his  attention 
to  the  dangers  of  infection  and  spoke  about  proper  pre- 
cautions, etc.  He  grimly  remarked  "There  is  no  danger 
of  my  becoming  infected.  I  couldn't  if  I  tried."  The 
dream  realizes  his  wish  that  he  can  become  infected; 
meaning  that  he  is  no  longer  sexually  impotent. 

Still  another  patient  suffering  from  the  same  disease 
dreamed  that  he  was  bald.  He  too  objected  to  the 
theory  of  wish  realization  inasmuch  as  he  is  only  thirty- 
five  years  old  and  he  surely  would  not  like  to  be  bald.  I 
told  him  that  except  with  children  a  dream  should  never 
be  judged  by  the  manifest  content.  When  he  began  to  give 
"free  associations"  to  the  dream  he  suddenly  thought  of  a 
smutty  joke  which  he  was  unwilling  to  reproduce.  I  in- 
sisted that  he  should  tell  me  everything,  otherwise  the  anal- 
ysis would  have  to  be  dropped.  The  joke  is  credited  to  one 
of  our  witty  statesmen  and  tells  how  at  a  social  gathering 
a  young  lady  heard  this  statesman  use  the  word  "eunuch." 
Not  knowing  the  meaning  of  the  word  she  turned  to  the 
statesman  and  said  "Mr.  X — ,  I  heard  you  use  the  word 
'eunuch.'  What  is  a  eunuch?"  The  statesman  was 
embarrassed  and  hesitatingly  answered  "A  eunuch  is  a 
balled  (bald)  man."  The  young  lady  looked  at  his  head 
and  said  "Then  you  are  a  eunuch."  "Oh,  no,"  he  replied, 
"I  am  too  bald  (two  balled)."  My  patient  heard  this 
joke   the  day   before   the  dream  and  he  laughed  very 


DREAMS  45 

heartily  over  it,  but  his  loud  and  prolonged  laughter  was 
only  hiding  his  inner  pain,  for  this  smutty  joke  brought 
to  mind  his  own  complex;  he  was  a  eunuch  himself. 
The  dream  was,  therefore,  a  reaction  to  his  mental  pain 
and  showed  him  that  he  was  not  a  eunuch.  He  is  too 
bald  (two  balled)  like  the  statesman  in  the  story.  The 
other  determinants  are  the  identification  of  the  bald 
head  with  the  head  of  the  penis,  an  identification  which  I 
have  repeatedly  observed  in  dreams  and  psychoses.  One 
of  my  patients,  a  young  prsecox,  had  one  mannerism 
which  was  shown  by  a  constant  rubbing  of  the  top  of  the 
head.  After  doing  this  for  a  few  months  he  had  a  good- 
sized  tonsure  which  was  rapidly  increasing.  I  could 
definitely  ascertain  that  the  patient  went  through  a  form 
of  masturbation.  He  was  not  allowed  to  masturbate  his 
penis  so  he  used  his  head.  Another  determinant  for  the 
baldness  in  the  dream  is  the  fact  that,  like  sexual  impo- 
tence, baldness,  too,  is  considered  as  a  sign  of  physical 
weakness  and  senile  decay.  These  examples  show  that 
even  dreams  which  are,  in  the  manifest  content,  the  oppo- 
site of  wishes,  nevertheless  contain  a  wish  when  we  find 
the  latent  content. 

The  transformation  of  the  latent  into  the  manifest 
content  of  the  dream  is  effected  as  follows  by  the  so-called 
"dream  work"  (Traumarbeit).  During  our  waking  state 
a  number  of  thought  structures  are  constantly  being 
formed.  This  activity  is  never  finished  during  the  day, 
and  the  sum  of  energy  required  for  the  production  of 
these  thoughts  would  be  sufficient  to  hold  the  interest  of 
the  individual  to  such  an  extent  as  to  interfere  with  sleep. 
These  day  remnants  are,  therefore,  changed  into  dreams 


46  PSYCHANALYSIS 

by  the  dream  work  and  the  elements  threatening  disturb- 
ance of  sleep  are  thus  removed.  The  dream  is,  therefore, 
the  guardian  of  sleep.  But  in  order  that  the  dream  work 
may  act  the  day  remnants  must  be  capable  of  wish  forma- 
tion, for  it  is  the  wish  that  forms  the  nucleus  of  the 
dream. 

When  we  compare  the  latent  thoughts  of  the  dream 
with  its  manifest  content  we  find  that  the  former  is  per- 
fectly comprehensible  as  soon  as  we  discover  it,  while 
the  latter  is  usually  incomprehensible  and  absurd  and 
comparable  to  hieroglyphics  or  a  rebus.  We  are  also 
struck  by  the  marked  conde?isation,  which  takes  place  in 
the  transformation  of  the  thought  into  the  content  of 
the  dream.*  The  manifest  dream  when  written  may 
fill  a  few  lines,  while  the  analysis  containing  the  thoughts 
underlying  the  dream  usually  fills  many  pages.  This 
condensation  is  effected  by  the  omission  and  the  subse- 
quent compression  of  syllables,  words,  pictures  or  situa- 
tions which  have  been  present  in  the  thoughts  underlying 
the  dream.  This  accounts  for  the  many  gaps,  absurdities 
and  neologisms  in  the  manifest  content  of  the  dream. 
Thus,  one  of  my  German  patients  saw  a  monkey  in  his 
dream,  and  by  freely  associating  to  the  word  "monkey" 
we  got  monkey — chimpanzee — Schimpfen  Sie  McKenzie 
(which  may  be  translated  here  by  "Give  it  to  him,  Mc- 
Kenzie"). This  recalled  a  quarrel  between  two  laborers, 
McKenzie  and  X.  the  day  before  the  dream.  The  patient 
actually  heard  this  very  exclamation,  "Give  it  to  him, 
McKenzie,"  and  as  a  diligent  student  of  English  he  imme- 
diately translated  it  into  the  above  German  sentence. 

♦Condensation  is  a  fusion  of  events,  pictures  and  elements  of  speech. 


DREAMS  47 

This  is  further  determined  by  the  fact  that  the  features 
of  the  pugnacious  McKenzie  made  him  think  of  a  monkey 
and  that  the  quarrel  took  place  near  a  zoological  garden. 
It  is  through  this  process  of  condensation  that  the  mani- 
fest thoughts  of  the  dream  are  "  overdetermined."  The 
individual  thoughts  of  the  dream  are  not  only  repre- 
sented in  the  dream  by  many  elements,  but  the  elements 
of  the  dream  are  manifoldly  determined  by  the  thoughts 
of  the  dream.  In  the  analysis  of  dreams  one  often  finds 
all  kinds  of  composites  such  as  composite  pictures  and 
collective  personalities,  all  of  which  are  produced  by  this 
process  of  condensation. 

Another  effect  of  the  dream  work  is  brought  about  by 
the  process  of  displacement.  Thus  the  elements  which 
seem  most  conspicuous  in  the  content  of  the  dream  do 
not  necessarily  have  corresponding  importance  in  the 
thoughts  of  the  dream.  An  insignificant  element  may 
represent  the  main  thought  and  vice  versa,  events, 
thoughts,  sentences,  words  and  pictures  may  be  turned 
around.  By  the  process  of  overdetermination  the  psy- 
chic validity  of  the  main  element  may  be  displaced  or 
transferred  to  some  triviality.  The  same  process  is  met 
in  the  obsessions  of  neurotics.9  The  formation  of  the 
dream  is  chiefly  due  to  these  two  processes  of  displace- 
ment and  condensation. 

Besides  the  processes  of  condensation  and  displace- 
ment which  we  have  found  so  effective  in  the  transfor- 
mation of  the  latent  into  the  manifest  thoughts  we  must 
take  into  account  two  other  factors,  viz.,  the  manner  of 
representation  and  the  secondary  elaboration,  to  which 
I  shall  only  allude.     There  is  no  intellectual  activity  in 


48  PSYCHANALYSIS 

the  dream.  What  in  the  manifest  eontent  impresses  us 
as  a  process  of  reasoning  or  judgment  is  not  due  to  the 
work  of  the  dream,  but  has  reached  the  manifest  content 
from  the  thoughts  of  the  dream  to  which  it  properly  be- 
longed. Logical  relationships  are  not  represented  in  the 
dream.  The  dream  makes  use  of  visual  pictures,  which 
are  reproduced  by  similarity,  identification  and  symboliza- 
tion.  Thus  a  dreamer,  wishing  to  express  that  his  business 
competitor  was  getting  the  better  of  him,  dreams  that  he  and 
his  competitor  are  running  to  catch  a  steamer  and  that  the 
latter  is  way  ahead  of  him.  Their  business  was  carried  on 
by  steamer  transportation.  The  affects  are  not  influenced 
by  the  dream  work,  though  they  are  very  often  displaced. 
The  dream  also  omits  all  the  "ifs"  and  "buts"  and  whatever 
may  be  in  the  subjunctive  mood  in  our  waking  state  is 
transferred  into  the  indicative  present  in  the  dream. 
This  accounts  for  the  fact  that  in  the  dream  the  blind 
see,  the  lame  run  and  the  poor  are  wealthy.  The  "If  I 
were"  is  changed  in  the  dream  into  "I  am." 

To  illustrate  the  relation  of  the  dream  to  the  neurosis 
I  shall  cite  the  following  case: 

Case:  Miss  G.,  twenty-eight  years  old,  American,  came  to  me  in 
January,  1908,  because  she  had  been  "  very  nervous"  for  about  three 
months.  Her  family  history  showed  that  her  father  died  of  nephritis 
and  had  a  "stroke"  (left  hemiplegia)  a  few  months  before  he  died. 
She  had  been  well  until  three  months  before.  Since  then  she  had 
suffered  from  insomnia,  irritability,  loss  of  appetite,  constipation, 
headache,  uncalled  for  worry,  crying  spells  and  anxious  expectation. 
Her  mother  stated  that  she  had  entirely  changed,  that  she  expressed 
pessimistic  ideas,  often  repeating  that  she  would  like  to  die.  Exami- 
nation showed  all  the  symptoms  enumerated.  The  patient  was 
pretty,  she  showed  no  stigmata  and  was  above  the  average  in  intelli- 
gence.    While  reciting  her  story  she  showed  the  typical  belle  indiffer- 


DREAMS  49 

ence  often  found  in  hysteria.  She  smiled  when  I  asked  her  why  she 
felt  so  depressed  and  could  give  no  reason  for  it.  She  knew  that  she 
really  had  nothing  to  worry  about  and  that  she  had  everything  to  live 
for,  yet  she  could  not  "shake  off  the  blue  feeling."  One  of  the  most 
distressing  thoughts  was  that  something  might  happen  to  her  mother. 
To  those  acquainted  with  the  language  of  hysteria  this  means  just 
the  opposite.  It  was  merely  a  reaction  of  the  wish  that  she 
might  lose  her  mother,  and,  as  we  shall  see  later,  there  was  a  reason 
for  that  wish.  Physically  there  was  nothing  worth  mentioning.  I 
diagnosticated  the  case  as  a  mild  anxiety  hysteria10  with  imperfect 
conversion. 

I  saw  her  a  number  of  times,  but  made  no  progress  in  the  treatment. 
To  my  question  she  always  answered  "  I  feel  about  the  same."  I  then 
thought  of  psychanalysis  and  with  that  in  view  I  asked  her  to  write 
out  her  dreams  and  bring  them  to  me.  She  was  sure  that  she  never 
dreamed  except  when  her  stomach  was  out  of  order,  but  promised  to 
comply  with  my  request  if  ever  she  should  and  one  day  brought  me 
the  following  dream: 

"I  dreamed  that  I  was  in  a  lonely  country  place  and  was  anxious  to 
reach  my  home  in  Liconow  or  Liconor  Bay,  but  could  not  get  there.  Every 
time  I  made  a  move  there  was  a  wall  in  the  way.  It  looked  like  a  street 
full  of  walls.  My  legs  were  as  heavy  as  lead.  I  could  only  walk  very 
slowly  as  if  I  ivere  very  weak  or  very  old.  Then  there  was  a  flock  of 
chickens,  but  that  seemed  to  be  in  a  crowded  city  street,  and  they — the 
chickens — ran  after  me  and  the  biggest  of  all  said  something  like  "  Come 
with  me  into  the  dark." 

This  dream  seems  absurd  enough  and  as  the  dreamer 
remarked,  "It  is  so  ridiculous  that  I  am  ashamed  to  tell 
it.  Whoever  heard  of  such  a  thing  as  chickens  talking?" 
She  was  assured  that  it  must  mean  something  and  the 
analysis  proceeded. 

It  would  be  too  long  and  immaterial  for  the  purposes 
of  this  work  to  give  here  the  whole  analysis  which,  when 
recorded,  covered  over  eight  pages  of  foolscap.  Only 
the  principal  associations  and  symbolic  expressions  neces- 
sary to  explain  the  dream  will  be  enumerated. 


50  PSYCHANALYSIS 

On  asking  the  dreamer  what  the  most  vivid  part  of  the 
dream  was  she  answered  that  it  was  the  second  part 
relating  to  the  chickens.  When  asked  to  repeat  the 
thoughts  evoked  by  concentrating  her  mind  on  the  word 
"chickens"  she  gave  the  following:  "I  could  only  see 
the  biggest  chicken,  all  the  others  seemed  blurred;  it  was 
unusually  big  and  had  a  very  long  neck  and  it  spoke  to 
me — the  street  recalls  where  I  used  to  go  to  school — I 
graduated  from  public  school  when  I  was  thirteen — the 
block  was  always  crowded  with  children  from  school" — 
she  then  began  to  blush  and  laugh  and  when  asked  to 
explain  her  actions  said:  "It  recalls  the  happy  school 
days  when  I  was  young  and  had  no  worries — I  even  had 
a  beau,  a  pupil  from  the  male  department.  There  was 
a  male  and  a  female  department  in  the  same  school  and 
most  of  my  girl  friends  had  beaux — we  used  to  meet  after 
school  hours  and  walk  home  together.  My  beau's  name 
was  F.  He  was  lanky  and  thin  and  the  girls  used  to 
tease  me  about  him.  Whenever  they  saw  him  coming 
they  said,  'Belle,  here  comes  your  chicken' — that  was 
his  nickname  among  the  boys."  On  being  asked  if  she 
now  understood  who  the  chicken  in  the  dream  was  she 
laughingly  said:  "You  don't  mean  to  say  that  the  chicken 
with  the  long  neck  was  Mr.  F.?"  When  asked  if  she  still 
kept  up  her  acquaintance  with  Mr.  F.  she  stated  that  she 
had  not  seen  him  for  the  last  few  months,  but  prior  to 
that  she  saw  him  quite  often.  On  further  analysis  it  was 
found  that  this  early  schoolday  love  was  still  kept  up. 
He  had  proposed  to  her  no  less  than  three  times,  but  she 
had  never  given  him  any  definite  answer.  She  only 
"liked"  him  and  her  family  opposed  him  on  account  of 


DREAMS  51 

his  financial  position.  The  last  time  she  met  him  was  at 
a  military  ball.  He  was  an  officer  of  a  military  organiz- 
ation and  "he  looked  quite  handsome  in  his  smart  uni- 
form." He  danced  with  her  and  "was  very  kind,"  but 
he  did  not  propose.  She  frankly  admitted  that  she  looked 
for  a  fourth  proposal  at  this  ball  and  that  she  was  quite 
ready  to  accept  him.  She  had  heard  only  recently  that 
he  was  paying  attention  to  another  young  lady,  a  thing 
which  caused  her  considerable  annoyance — to  put  it  in  her 
own  words,  "I  can  only  blame  myself  and  I  will  have  to 
forget  it." 

We  see  that  the  most  impossible  and  ludicrous  part  of 
the  dream,  that  is,  "the  talking  of  the  chicken,"  is  now 
quite  plain.  The  "chicken"  is  simply  the  nickname  of 
Mr.  F.,  who  is  the  hero  of  the  dream.  There  were  other 
chickens,  but  they  were  blurred,  that  is,  there  were  other 
young  suitors,  but  they  were  relegated  to  the  background. 

The  chicken  said  "Come  with  me  into  the  dark."  The 
word  "dark"  evoked  the  following  associations:  indis- 
tinct— obscure — mystery — marriage.  She  recalled  that 
after  her  father's  death  her  mother  once  spoke  sympathet- 
ically of  Mr.  F.  saying  "Money  is  not  all,"  and  philoso- 
phized on  marriage  in  the  following  remarks:  "You  will 
never  know  a  man  until  you  have  eaten  a  peck  of  salt 
with  him"  and  "Marriage  is  a  mystery."  These  words 
made  a  deep  impression  on  her  and  the  last  Biblical 
quotation  frequently  recurred  to  her.  We  then  see  that 
in  her  mind  the  word  "dark"  was  used  synonomously 
with  mystery  and  marriage,  and  hence  we  can  under- 
stand its  meaning  in  the  chicken's  speech.  Briefly  stated 
it  was  the  fourth  proposal  of  Mr.  F. 


52  PSYCHANALYSI8 

The  first  part  of  the  dream  reads,  "1  was  in  a  lonely 
country  place,  etc.  "She  stated  that  she  recalled  the 
beautiful  country  around  H.  Bay  where  she  had  been 
the  preceding  summer.  She  could  not  quite  understand 
what  Liconow  or  Liconor  Bay  meant  and  gave  the  follow- 
ing associations:  Liconow — Lucknow — meaning  a  paint- 
ing representing  the  famous  battle  of  Lucknow  which  she 
had  recently  seen.  The  soldiers  recalled  the  military 
organization  at  whose  ball  she  had  met  Mr.  F.  The 
word  "Liconor"  suggested  by  sound  association  Lucarno 
and  Lugano,  two  places  which  she  had  visited  while 
abroad  two  years  before.  H.  Bay  often  recalled  the 
beautiful  Italian  lakes,  Lucarno  and  Lugano,  whither  she 
hoped  to  go  on  her  honeymoon.  Finally,  Liconor  Bay 
resolved  itself  into  LIK-ONOR  BAY  which,  by  sound 
association,  can  be  readily  recognized  as  "like,  honor 
and  obey."  If  "like"  is  substituted  by  "love"  it  gives 
the  familiar  formula  well  known  to  all  maidens  seriously 
contemplating  matrimony.  The  dreamer  used  "like," 
because,  as  aforesaid,  she  thought  she  only  "liked." 
Such  condensations  of  words  and  ideas  are  not  at  all  rare 
in  dreams. 

If  we  now  rewrite  the  first  sentence  it  will  read  as  fol- 
lows: "I  was  in  a  lonely  country  place  and  was  anxious  to 
reach  my  home  in  'LIKe  Gove),  hONOR,  and  oBEY,'  " 
that  is,  "I  was  lonely  and  anxious  to  get  married." 

The  next  sentence  reads  "But  could  not,  etc."  She 
stated  that  her  legs  "were  as  heavy  as  lead,"  she  was 
alone  and  was  afraid  that  something  might  happen,  but 
she  was  unable  to  make  any  headway.  The  sensation 
of  inhibition  experienced  in  dreams,  like  the  inability  to 


DREAMS  53 

make  any  headway  when  one  most  desires  to  do  so,  sig- 
nifies a  marked  mental  conflict.  Here,  too,  it  merely 
shows  the  great  mental  conflict  in  our  dreamer's  mind. 
She  is  anxious  to  marry.  She  "likes"  Mr.  F.  Moreover, 
she  is  of  an  advanced  age  and,  as  the  dream  shows,  she 
could  walk  only  very  slowly  as  if  "she  were  weak  or  very 
old,"  that  is,  the  difficulties  on  the  road  to  matrimony 
increase  with  advancing  age.  She  is  weak  and  old,  that  is, 
she  is  an  "old  maid,"  an  expression  by  which  she  often 
jocosely  referred  to  herself  in  her  waking  state.  All  of 
these  arguments  are  in  favor  of  accepting  Mr.  F.,  but 
then  her  family  is  opposed  to  him.  He  is  a  nice  enough 
young  man,  but  he  is  unable  to  care  for  her  in  a  manner 
befitting  her  station  in  life. 

The  dream  continues:  "Every  time  I  made  a  move 
there  was  a  wall  in  the  way,  it  looked  like  a  street  full  of  walls, 
etc."  A  street  full  of  walls  signifies  Wall  street,  hence 
money — that  was  the  real  obstacle.  When  told  of  the 
interpretation  she  laughingly  remarked  "That's  it  exactly. 
I  even  thought  very  seriously  of  helping  him  along,  as 
Pa  left  me  some  money,  but  then  everything  is  invested 
in  Wall  street  and  there  is  a  tacit  understanding  among 
ourselves  that  the  whole  estate  shall  be  left  intact  until 
mother's  death." 

We  now  understand  the  latent  thoughts  of  the  dream. 
The  first  part  can  be  translated  as  follows:  I  am  twenty- 
eight  years  old,  an  old  maid,  and  I  am  anxious  to  marry 
Mr.  F.,  but  then  he  is  not  rich  enough  to  take  care  of  me. 
I  perhaps  can  help  him  financially.  In  the  second  part 
we  find  the  wish  realization,  as  here  Mr.  F.  actually  pro- 
poses to  her  for  the  fourth  time. 


54  PSYCHANALYSIS 

These  were  the  actual  thoughts  which  had  occupied 
our  dreamer's  mind  for  the  past  months  and  which,  as  she 
quite  frankly  admitted,  she  tried  hard  to  forget.  It  is 
quite  obvious  that  the  dream  deals  here  with  the  thoughts 
which  a  young  lady  would  not  consciously  disclose  even 
to  her  physician,  and  we  can  also  understand  why  she  was 
"ashamed  to  tell  it"  because  she  understood  it  uncon- 
sciously, though  not  consciously.  The  dream  never 
deals  with  trivialities,  and,  no  matter  how  simple  and 
innocent  it  may  seem,  the  analysis  invariably  shows  that 
the  thoughts  behind  it  belong  to  the  inmost  recesses  of 
personality.  This  accounts  for  the  many  resistances 
encountered  during  the  analysis.  The  psychic  censor 
constantly  inhibits  the  painful  or  disagreeable  complexes 
from  becoming  conscious  and  is  also  responsible  for  the 
rapid  forgetting  of  dreams  on  awakening.* 

Dreams  often  help  us  to  make  a  correct  diagnosis. 
This  is  especially  true  in  the  anxiety  states  and  homo- 
sexuality. People  who  are  subject  to  nightmares  or 
who  have  anxiety  dreams  usually  suffer  from  lack  of 
sexual  gratification.  I  do  not  mean  merely  the  gross 
sexual,  but  I  use  the  word  in  the  Freudian  sense.  We 
must  be  very  careful  in  our  examination,  otherwise  we 
may  make  mistakes.  Thus  a  married  woman  suffered 
from  a  pronounced  anxiety  hysteria  and  was  subject  to 
frequent  nightmares,  but  on  being  questioned  she  stated 

*  Not  infrequently  patients  "stop  dreaming"  altogether.  On  telling 
one  of  my  patients  that  the  sudden  forgetting  of  all  his  dreams  was 
due  to  an  unconscious  resistance,  he  remarked:  "I'll  get  you  some 
dreams  tomorrow  if  I  have  to  stay  awake  the  whole  night."  His 
words  only  confirmed  my  diagnosis,  for  no  one  can  stay  awake  the 
whole  night  and  dream  at  the  same  time. 


DREAMS  55 

that  her  sexual  life  was  normal.  A  few  weeks  later  I 
discovered  that  she  was  suffering  from  frigidity  and 
although  she  was  married  six  years  she  never  experienced 
an  orgasm  or  any  pleasure  in  coitus. 

I  have  made  many  diagnoses  of  homosexuality  from 
the  patient's  dreams.  Many  homosexuals  go  to  doctors, 
but  do  not  tell  them  the  true  state  of  affairs.  They  are 
usually  sensitive  and  not  knowing  how  the  physician  will 
look  upon  them  they  complain  of  something  else.  Thus, 
a  homosexual  whom  I  saw  in  the  Vanderbilt  clinic  com- 
plained of  pain  in  the  thigh.  His  dream  told  me  the  true 
story.  It  also  happens  that  the  patients  do  not  know 
that  they  are  homosexual.  This  is  usually  the  case 
with  women,  but  I  have  seen  at  least  two  men  who  were 
ignorant  of  their  being  homosexual.  Their  dreams  first 
called  my  attention  to  the  fact.  But  it  should  be  remem- 
bered that  one  is  not  to  judge  by  the  manifest  content  of 
the  dream  as  does  Nacke,11  for  a  dream  may  not  show  any- 
thing of  the  gross  homosexual  in  its  manifest  content  and 
still  be  a  homosexual  dream.  This  is  shown  by  the  follow- 
ing dream  brought  to  me  by  a  man  of  thirty-five  years: 
"/  saw  two  men.  One  looked  at  an  open  newspaper  and  the 
other  watched  him  sidewise,  reading  his  thoughts  like  a 
detective.  Suddenly  tJie  latter  stabbed  the  man  with  the  news- 
paper by  plunging  a  dagger  into  his  heart.  Great  commo- 
tion— crowd." 

After  reading  the  dream  as  it  was  written  by  the  patient 
immediately  on  awakening  three  hours  before,  I  asked 
him  to  tell  me  the  dream  from  memory.  He  reproduced 
the  dream  correctly,  but  made  one  mistake;  instead  of 
saying  that  the  dagger  was  plunged  into  the  heart  he 


56  PSYCHANALYSIS 

said  that  it  was  plunged  into  the  back.  My  object  in 
asking  him  to  reproduce  the  dream  was  this:  From  the 
association  experiments  of  the  Zurich  school12  we  know 
that  a  failure  of  reproduction  is  a  complex  indicator;  that 
is,  whenever  the  answer  is  forgotten  it  shows  that  the 
word  or  passage  in  question  is  of  marked  emotional  accen- 
tuation and  contains  something  cryptic.  It  has  the  same 
mechanism  as  the  lapsus  linguae  or  any  other  mistake. 
Now  let  us  take  up  the  analysis:  A  crowd  in  the  dream 
signifies  a  secret.  The  two  men  were  readily  identified  as 
the  dreamer  himself  and  a  young  man  with  whom  he  spent 
the  evening  of  the  night  of  the  dream.  The  dreamer  was 
treated  for  homosexuality — passive  pederasty — and  the 
murderer  of  the  dream  is  a  young  man  with  whom  he  is 
secretly  in  love.  Those  of  my  readers  who  may  be  ac- 
quainted with  dream  analysis  know  that  the  dagger  is  a 
symbol  for  the  penis.  Women  suffering  from  lack  of 
sexual  gratification  often  dream  of  being  attacked  with 
knives,  daggers,  etc.  Here  the  dream  shows  the  realiza- 
tion of  a  wish  to  act  as  a  passive  pederast  for  the  young 
man  he  loves.  The  stabbing  taking  place  in  the  heart 
shows  the  familiar  mechanism  of  displacement  from  below 
to  above.  The  lower  part  of  the  body  being  tabooed, 
the  action  is  transferred  to  the  upper  part;  but  the  mis- 
take very  nicely  pointed  to  the  patient's  true  wish;  the 
dagger  was  plunged  into  the  back.13 

Other  examples  showing  how  dreams  solve  the  problems 
of  the  neuroses  are  the  following: 

An  unmarried  woman,  Z.,  of  thirty  years,  was  treated  by  me  for 
hysteria.  One  of  the  distressing  symptoms  was  morning  nausea 
with  occasional  vomiting  from  which  she  was  suffering  from  periods 


DREAMS  57 

of  two  and  three  months  for  the  last  five  years.  She  stated  that  she 
was  treated  for  it  during  all  these  years,  but  without  success.  I  soon 
concluded  that  the  symptom  was  hysterical  and  paid  no  particular 
attention  to  it  as  it  was  only  one  out  of  many  others.  One  day  she 
told  me  the  following  dream: 

1.  "/  dreamed  that  Mgt.  and  I  were  'pregnant  and  in  some  way  or 
other  I  thought  that  birds  were  connected  with  this  pregnancy. 

2.  "  Then  I  dreamed  of  looking  down  on  my  own  or  some  one's  else 
bare  toes.  Each  toe  became  the  head  of  a  man  as  I  looked  and  they  all 
seemed  to  be  smiling  or  laughing.  One  of  the  heads  looked  like  S.  V.,  a 
male  acquaintance." 

A  few  facts  before  proceeding  with  the  analysis.  Z.  was  bi-sexual 
and  since  the  age  of  sixteen  years  had  many  homosexual  amours. 
Mgt.  was  her  friend  with  whom  she  had  been  in  love  for  years.  Mgt. 
was  aware  of  it  and  as  she  is  not  homosexual  they  were  forced  to 
remain  apart.  They  saw  each  other  now  and  then  and  were  very 
friendly.  Z.  came  to  me  in  1910  and  at  that  time  she  suffered  from 
fits  of  depression  following  periodic  debauches  of  masturbation. 
Mgt.  was  the  object  of  her  masturbatic  fancies. 

When  I  asked  her  to  focus  her  attention  on  the  idea  of 
pregnancy  and  repeat  her  associations  she  stated  that 
there  was  a  time  when  she  was  in  mortal  dread  of  being 
pregnant.  At  the  age  of  nine  years  she  was  seduced  by  a 
farm  hand  and  had  sexual  relations  with  him.  When 
she  was  ten  years  old  she  heard  that  girls  became  pregnant 
as  a  result  of  such  relations  and  she  was  terrified  at  the 
thought  of  it  because  she  imagined  that  she  was  pregnant 
and  that  her  parents  would  discover  her  relations  with  this 
man.  Her  first  sexual  instructions  were  received  at  a  very 
early  age.  An  older  child  called  her  attention  to  the 
sexual  acts  of  the  poultry  which  she  watched  with  great 
interest.  She  imagined  that  women  laid  eggs  like  chickens. 
The  day  of  the  dream  she  yearned  for  a  child.  She  spoke 
with  Mgt.  about  the  voidness  in  their  lives  and  both  agreed 


58  PSYCHANALYSIS 

that  they  would  be  contented  if  they  each  had  a  child. 
She  herself  had  had  this  wish  for  years  as  she  is  very  fond 
of  children.  Birds  to  her  mean  chickens.  She  was 
brought  up  on  a  farm  and  the  poultry  was  always  referred 
to  as  birds.  The  first  part  of  the  dream,  therefore,  realized 
the  wish  that  she  and  Mgt.  were  pregnant  and  the  second 
part  of  the  dream,  as  will  be  seen,  shows  who  was  respon- 
sible for  it.  When  asked  to  associate  to  the  word  "toes" 
she  thought  of  a  foot  as  this  brought  to  her  mind  that  when 
she  carried  on  her  affair  with  the  farm-hand  he  was  in  the 
habit  of  touching  her  with  his  bare  feet  in  forbidden  places 
while  the  family  was  sitting  around  the  table.  The  toe  is 
also  a  symbol  for  the  penis.  The  toes  resolved  themselves 
into  the  heads  of  laughing  men  and  one  looked  like  S.  V. 
She  dislikes  the  latter  because  he  has  a  "dirty  mind."  He 
has  the  reputation  of  being  a  libertine.  He  is,  therefore,  the 
right  man  in  the  right  place  and,  though  she  consciously 
rejects  him,  he  is  accepted  by  her  unconsciously.  There  are 
many  more  subtler  determinants  for  this  dream  which  I  am 
forced  to  omit  here. 

At  the  age  of  twenty-four  she  discovered  for  the  first 
t  ime  that  pregnancy  was  accompanied  by  morning  nausea 
and  vomiting.  Some  time  after  she  began  to  suffer  from 
the  nausea  and  vomiting.  The  symptom  was  therefore 
the  expression  of  a  wish  realization  and  I  could  definitely 
show  that  it  came  on  when  the  wish  was  especially  strong. 
With  the  analysis  the  symptoms  disappeared. 

A  young  married  Englishman  suffering  from  a  compulsion  neurosis 
was  obsessed  by  the  thought  of  socialism.  The  obsession  came  on 
during  the  notorious  McNamara  trial  and  persisted  with  increasing 


DREAMS  59 

vigor  until  he  came  to  see  me  a  few  months  ago.  No  matter  in  what 
surrounding  he  was,  whether  at  his  desk  or  in  the  theater,  he  would  have 
to  discuss  with  himself  socialism.  He  would  wake  up  mornings  with 
the  question  "  Is  socialism  a  correct  theory,  is  socialism  a  true  theory 
of  economics?"  and  he  would  then  argue  for  and  against  it.  He  would 
read  books  and  pamphlets  on  the  subject,  but  could  never  come  to 
any  decision.  While  talking  with  friends  the  idea  would  obtrude 
itself:  "It  will  be  terrible  when  the  government  will  control  every- 
thing and  some  new  conditions  will  come  into  being  which  will 
influence  me  materially.  I  wonder  whether  the  president  is  convinced 
of  the  truth  of  the  socialistic  doctrines,  etc."  While  attending  a  play 
he  would  be  bothered  by  the  idea  that  it  was  wrong  for  him  to  spend 
money  on  luxuries  when  there  were  other  persons  starving.  Indeed 
the  patient  stated  that  there  was  not  half  an  hour  when  he  was  free 
from  thoughts  on  socialism.  With  the  characteristic  arguments  of 
folie  raisonant  he  went  through  the  most  absurd  and  abstruse  argu- 
mentations. Lest  there  should  be  some  misunderstanding  I  will 
state  that  ordinarily  the  patient  had  no  interest  at  all  in  socialism; 
he  professed  Catholicism  and  was  quite  conservative  in  his  ideas. 
He  realized  the  absurdity  of  his  compulsive  thinking,  but  was  power- 
less to  control  it. 

After  coming  to  me  for  a  few  weeks  he  brought  the  following  dream : 
"  Bernard  Shaw,  the  writer,  was  the  guest  at  some  affair  and  I  was  there, 
too.  There  was  another  man  there  who,  when  he  removed  his  'peculiar 
wig,  I  noticed  was  tlve  humorous  writer  0." 

The  determinants  of  the  dream  were  as  follows:  A  few- 
days  before  he  had  read  that  the  Governor  General  of 
Jamaica  is  a  socialist  and  that  he  once  shocked  the  English 
aristocracy  by  inviting  Bernard  Shaw  to  one  of  his  social 
gatherings.  The  day  before  the  dream  he  had  read  a  refer- 
ence to  Brieux's  play  "  Damaged  Goods, "  a  play  dealing 
with  sex  to  which  Bernard  Shaw  wrote  a  preface.  On  con- 
tinuing the  association  he  recalled  the  story  of  "Man  and 
Superman,"  Shaw's  play;  how  everyone  was  shocked  be- 
cause a  girl  was  supposed  to  have  been  pregnant  and  how 
the  hero,  Tanner,  defended  her  saying  that  she  was  going 


60  PSYCHANALYSIS 

to  perform  the  noblest  function  of  womanhood.  He,  too, 
is  liberal  on  the  question  of  sex.  The  lady's  name  was 
Violet.     His  wife's  name  is  Viola. 

According  to  the  rules  of  association  there  must  have 
been  a  close  relationship  between  the  sexual  lives  of  Shaw's 
heroine  and  his  wife  and  further  investigation  actually 
showed  that  this  was  so.  In  brief  he  admitted  that  for 
some  time  before  marriage  they  led  a  sexual  life  and  that 
on  a  few  occasions  she  had  reason  to  fear  pregnancy. 
The  subject  of  pregnancy  came  up  again  the  night  before 
the  dream  because  he  imagined  that  his  wife  was  getting 
stout.  He  stated  that  he  did  not  have  the  slightest 
apprehension  about  it  as  the  proper  precautions  were 
taken;  that  everything  was  well  when  he  left  home  a 
few  weeks  ago  (he  returned  the  day  before  the  dream). 
He  refused  to  proceed  with  the  associations,  but  upon  be- 
ing urged  he  reproduced  a  rather  intimate  scene  between 
himself  and  his  wife.  For  some  reason  he  was  depressed 
and  kept  on  asking  his  wife  "Aren't  you  all  mine,  aren't 
you  all  mine?"  and  despite  all  her  assurance  he  asked  the 
question  over  and  over  again.  I  told  him  that  judging 
from  this  scene  one  would  think  that  he  was  not  sure  of 
his  wife's  fidelity.  He  readily  admitted  that  while  it 
did  not  enter  his  mind  during  this  scene  he  has  entertained 
ideas  of  jealousy  since  he  first  became  acquainted  with 
his  wife.  To  my  question  he  answered  that  he  is  not 
jealous  of  any  particular  man,  that  the  idea  is  vague  and 
that  he  suppresses  it  as  soon  as  it  crosses  his  mind.  He 
then  recalled  that  before  he  met  his  wife  he  was  inter- 
ested in  another  girl  to  whom  his  parents  objected.  His 
mother  said  that  "she  was  a  rag  on  every  bush,"  meaning 


DREAMS  61 

that  she  was  owned  by  a  great  many  men.  This  recalled 
to  him  that  while  he  was  separated  from  his  wife  he  met  a 
great  many  women  who  were  "  a  rag  on  every  bush."  He 
did  not  yield  to  temptation,  but  entertained  a  great  many 
forbidden  fancies. 

The  associations  making  up  the  elements  of  the  dream 
thus  far  reproduced  brought  to  light  a  complex  of  marked 
emotional  feeling,  the  content  of  which  was  jealousy.  He 
suspected  his  wife  of  infidelity,  but  he  had  no  particular 
person  in  mind.     It  was  simply  a  general  jealousy. 

When  asked  about  Mr.  0.  in  the  dream  he  stated  that 
he  did  not  know  it  was  Mr.  0.  until  he  removed  his  wig. 
He  is  not  acquainted  personally  with  0.,  but  knows  him 
by  sight.  He  heard  that  although  0.  is  married  he  does 
not  disdain  light  flirtations  when  he  is  away  from  his 
wife.  He  excuses  O.'s  actions  by  saying  that  he  belongs 
to  a  rather  passionate  type  of  man.  His  description  of 
O.  corresponds  to  himself  and  when  I  called  his  attention 
to  it  he  at  once  corroborated  it  by  saying  that  he  was 
aware  of  the  remarkable  resemblance  between  them  and 
that  strangers  have  noticed  it.  When  I  asked  him  about 
the  wig  he  stated  that  0.  recently  wrote  a  pseudoscientific 
paper  on  hair  culture.  For  many  delicate  reasons  which 
cannot  be  explained  he  himself  had  of  late  something  to 
do  with  hair. 

These  associations,  as  well  as  others  that  need  not  be 
mentioned,  not  only  explain  the  dream  fragment  but  also 
the  obsession.  The  dream  deals  with  the  most  intimate 
factors  of  the  dreamer's  life.  In  brief  he  is  not  sure  of 
his  wife,  and  although  he  is  an  admirer  of  Shaw  he  is  not 
quite  willing  to  accept  his  views  on  sex.     He  does  not 


62  PSYCHANALYSIS 

believe  in  freedom  of  sex,  he  wants  his  wife  to  have  no 
other  man  beside  himself.  While  he  was  separated  from 
her  he  was  restrained  in  his  temptation  by  the  thought 
that  he  had  no  right  to  practise  what  he  would  abhor  in 
his  wife.  He  does  not  believe  in  collective  ownership 
when  it  concerns  his  own  wife.  In  the  dream,  however, 
he  identifies  himself  with  O.,  who,  according  to  his  belief, 
is  quite  free  in  his  marital  vows.  In  other  words,  what's 
right  for  the  goose  is  not  necessarily  so  for  the  gander. 
This  conflict  which  existed  since  his  betrothal,  and  which 
is  very  painful  to  him,  therefore  appears  under  the  obses- 
sion of  socialism  which,  to  our  patient,  is  "collective  owner- 
ship, common  possession."  The  truth  of  this  assump- 
tion was  confirmed  by  the  fact  that  the  obsession  disap- 
peared as  soon  as  its  true  meaning  became  known  to  the 
patient. 

I  saw  Miss  A.  for  the  first  time  in  August,  1911,  when  she  was  referred 
to  me  by  Dr.  Morton  Prince,  of  Boston.  At  that  time  she  suffered  from 
fits  of  depression  and  despondency,  which  were  the  results  of  sexual 
conflicts.  She  was  bisexually  predisposed,  more  homo-  than  hetero- 
sexual, and  before  coming  to  us  had  gone  through  a  number  of  unhappy 
homosexual  affairs.  Due  to  her  unrequited  libido  she  masturbated 
rather  excessively,  and  suffered  from  the  usual  conflicts  of  the  chronic 
masturbator.  The  conditions  were  not  favorable  for  a  regular  course 
of  psychanalytic  treatment,  so  I  saw  her  only  a  few  times  a  month, 
and  after  a  few  months  she  left  me  very  much  improved.  She  returned 
about  six  months  later,  and  since  then  I  have  seen  her  periodically  two 
or  three  times  a  month.  I  shall  not  enter  into  the  various  mechanisms 
at  play,  as  I  have  no  intention  of  describing  the  case  as  such.  I  will 
simply  state  that  besides  the  symptoms  mentioned  she  showed  many 
others  of  a  hysterical  character,  and  I  will  here  describe  the  analysis 
of  one  of  the  symptoms. 

When  she  came  to  me  last  fall  she  told  me  she  was  getting  along  very 
well,  except  for  the  following  complaint:  she  imagined  that  she  had 


DREAMS  63 

cancer  in  the  right  breast.  She  had  no  definite  pain,  but  felt  a  peculiar 
annoying  feeling.  There  was  no  growth  or  mark  of  any  kind  to  justify 
the  slightest  suspicion,  as  is  usual  in  such  cases.  She  herself  realized 
that  she  had  no  cancer,  still  she  could  not  shake  off  her  obsessive 
fear.  I  tried  to  get  some  light  on  the  subject,  but  I  could  discover 
nothing  important.  A  few  weeks  later  she  brought  me  the  following 
dream: 

"/  dreamed  that  I  was  inspecting  a  cellar  belonging  to  an  Italian  woman. 
The  cellar  was,  or  we  were,  exposed  to  the  view  of  a  man.  It  seemed  that 
I  knew  that  in  the  cellar  there  was  gold  or  some  other  valuable  thing.  I  saw 
this  man  watching  me.  I  went  down  and  he  followed  me.  He  was  tall, 
young,  rather  well  dressed,  but  brutal  looking.  I  was  sure  that  he  intended 
to  do  me  some  harm  in  order  to  get  the  gold  or  valuables,  and  I  managed 
to  call,  'Police!  Police!  Police!'  I  was  surprised  that  I  could  call  out 
at  all  as  I  was  very  badly  frightened.  Then  I  called,  'Help!  Help!  Help!' 
but  my  voice  could  not  carry  very  far.  Then  the  man  quickly  plunged  a 
stiletto  into  my  right  breast,  just  below  the  fleshy  part.  I  felt  a  sickening 
sensation  and  began  to  swoon.  I  then  reached  my  hand  up  and  began  to 
pull  out  the  dagger.  I  could  hear  the  queer  noise  it  made  separating  from 
the  bones  and  flesh,  and  felt  a  wet  feeling  around  it.  I  pulled  it  only  a  little 
way  when  I  woke  up." 

As  soon  as  she  began  to  focus  her  attention  on  the  dream  she  dimly 
recalled  that  she  had  a  similar  dream  before  she  perceived  the  feeling 
in  the  chest,  which  was  later  formed  into  the  cancer  obsession.  This 
led  me  to  think  that  we  dealt  here  with  a  resolution  dream,  that  the 
dreamer  resolved  to  do  a  certain  thing,  and  the  dream  continued  to 
represent  it  as  realized  because  it  was  not  accomplished.  Now  let  us 
see  what  the  dream  represents  as  fulfilled.  The  associations  to  cellar 
were  the  lower  part  of  the  house,  filthy  cellars  in  tenements,  a 
dark,  mysterious  opening,  the  female  genitals.  This  was  also  cor- 
roborated by  the  fact  that  she  was  aware  in  the  dream  that  the  cellar 
contained  some  gold  or  other  valuable  thing.  The  description  of  the 
man  corresponds  to  the  type  of  man  that  plays  a  part  in  her  fancies. 
She  is  very  masochistic  and  of  the  very  petite  type,  and  a  "tall,  young( 
rather  well-dressed,  but  brutal  looking  man,"  would  just  suit  her.  This 
is  shown  in  the  dream  by  the  fact  that  she  was  sure  that  he  intended  to 
do  her  some  harm  in  order  to  get  the  gold  or  valuables.  The  stiletto 
and  the  stabbing  in  the  breast  are  symbolic  of  coitus,  and  show  the  well- 
known  mechanism  of  displacement  from  below  to  above.     This  is  further 


64  PSYCHANALYSIS 

determined  by  the  fact  that  at  the  age  of  nine  years  the  dreamer  had 
sexual  relations  with  a  man  of  the  type  described  in  the  dream.  The 
dream  is,  therefore,  a  symbolic  expression  of  coitus,  which  played  a  very 
great  part  in  the  dreamer's  mind  at  that  time.  The  feeling  in  the  breast, 
or  the  phobia,  was  the  remnant  of  the  dream,  which,  through  conversion, 
became  a  hysterical  symptom  and  symbolized  pregnancy,  which  was  her 
strongest  wish.  This  case  shows  the  influence  of  dreams  on  waking 
life,  as  described  by  Jones,14  and  dreams  as  determinants  of  the  form 
of  symptoms  as  described  by  Waterman15  and  others.  The  symptom 
disappeared  with  the  analysis. 

It  is  not  only  in  diagnosing  gross  neurotic  symptoms 
that  the  dream  is  of  service,  but  it  also  helps  us  to  diagnose 
and  cure  so-called  peculiar  traits  of  character.  To 
illustrate  this  I  will  cite  the  following  case: 

A  young  married  woman  of  twenty-six  years  consulted  me  and 
decided  to  come  to  me  for  regular  psychanalytic  treatment.  When 
she  was  about  to  leave  she  wished  to  pay  me  for  the  consultation.  I 
told  her  that  it  was  my  custom  to  send  monthly  statements  to  my 
patients  and  that  she  might  wait  until  the  end  of  the  month  before 
paying  me.  She  thanked  me  for  my  offer,  but  emphatically  declared 
that  she  would  pay  at  the  end  of  each  consultation,  adding  that  she 
always  pays  cash,  be  it  to  the  doctor,  druggist,  grocer,  milliner  or 
dressmaker.  Knowing  that  she  was  a  woman  of  means  I  naturally 
thought  it  strange  and  I  remarked  something  to  that  effect.  She 
then  told  me  that  all  her  friends  and  acquaintances,  including  her 
husband,  think  that  she  is  peculiar  in  this  respect,  but  that  does  not 
alter  her  desire  not  to  "run  up  any  bills"  and  to  pay  cash  for  every- 
thing. She  came  to  me  daily  except  Sunday  and  always  paid  before 
leaving.  After  coming  to  me  for  a  week  or  two  she  once  forgot  to  pay, 
but  within  a  few  minutes  she  returned  excitedly  and  although  I  was 
busy  with  the  next  patient  she  insisted  upon  seeing  me.  She  was  very 
profuse  in  her  apologies  despite  my  assuring  her  that  there  was  no 
need  for  her  returning,  let  alone  for  apologizing.  The  following  week 
the  same  thing  happened  again  with  the  same  results.  A  week  later 
she  actually  forgot  to  pay  and  did  not  recall  it  until  she  returned 
home.  She  telephoned,  however,  and  insisted  upon  sending  my  fee 
to  me  by  special  delivery. 


DREAMS  65 

Considering  the  financial  experiences  we  physicians  sometimes  have 
with  patients  I  should  have  had  no  cause  for  complaint  and  that  was 
exactly  what  one  of  my  colleagues  who  is  interested  in  psychanalysis 
thought.  But  when  I  asked  him  the  meaning  of  the  patient's 
extreme  scrupulosity  he  stated  that  judging  by  the  fact  that  she  had 
forgotten  to  pay  on  a  number  of  occasions  it  would  seem  that  she  was 
not  quite  pleased  with  the  treatment  and  hence  did  not  like  to  pay  for 
it.  His  reasoning  was  in  accordance  with  psychanalytic  experience 
as  we  are  taught  that  there  is  no  accidental  forgetting  and  that  there 
is  always  a  purpose  in  forgetting.  We  usually  forget  what  we  do  not 
wish  to  remember.  But  I  pointed  out  to  him  that  both  she  herself 
and  her  friends  assert  that  this  feeling — "the  terrible  honesty,"  as 
one  friend  called  it — has  existed  since  girlhood  so  that  it  could  not 
have  any  special  bearing  on  her  feeling  toward  the  treatment.  More- 
over, I  was  very  sure  that  she  was  satisfied  with  the  progress  she  was 
making  in  the  treatment.  A  few  weeks  later  she  brought  the  following 
dream:  "/  was  invited  to  tea  at  the  house  of  J.,  but  I  did  not  go.  Instead 
I  went  with  a  large  party  of  school  girls  on  some  sort  of  picnic.  When  it 
came  to  be  7  o'clock  I  was  sorry  that  J.  had  been  waiting  for  me  all 
the  afternoon  and  knew  that  I  ought  to  telephone  her.  I  went  out  to 
telephone  and  found  that  I  had  no  money.  I  saw  a  gold  piece  lying 
before  me.  I  knew  to  whom  it  belonged,  in  fact  people  were  looking  for 
it,  but  as  I  needed  money  to  telephone  I  did  not  give  it  up.  I  knew  I 
was  a  thief  and  I  was  sorry,  but  I  kept  the  money  just  the  same.  Then 
I  began  to  borrow  everything — money,  gloves,  etc. — and  people  all  seemed 
to  be  afraid  I  would  not  return  the  things  I  borrowed." 

For  many  reasons  I  am  only  giving  a  fragment  of  a  long 
dream,  but  it  will  suffice  to  demonstrate  what  I  wish  to 
point  out.  The  dream  was  determined  by  the  following 
experiences  of  the  day  before:  She  was  invited  to  a  tea 
and  did  not  like  to  go.  She  received  a  letter  from  a 
schoolmate  inviting  her  to  visit  her.  She  had  some  con- 
versation about  money  matters  with  her  husband.  There 
were  many  associations  which  I  shall  omit  as  not  abso- 
lutely necessary  and  will  confine  myself  to  those  directly 
bearing  on  the  complex.     When  I  asked  her  to  focus  her 

5 


66  PSYCHANALYSIS 

attention  on  the  gold  piece  she  suddenly  became  very 
emotional.  She  begged  me  not  to  press  her  to  tell  me 
this  particular  thought  as  it  was  very  painful,  etc.,  etc. 
After  much  argument  and  protest  she  gave  the  following 
associations:  Her  mother  was  not  faithful  to  her  father, 
and  as  he  was  frequently  away  on  business  she  entertained 
many  intrigues.  It  was  when  my  patient  was  a  little 
girl  of  about  seven  or  eight  years  that  she  came  into  the 
room  unobserved  by  her  mother  and  saw  the  latter  going 
through  the  pockets  of  one  of  her  paramours  who  was 
too  intoxicated  to  protest.  She  left  as  she  entered,  but 
she  never  forgave  her  mother  for  it.  She  said  nothing, 
but  for  a  long  time  she  felt  a  strong  resentment  and 
aversion  toward  her  mother.  Nevertheless,  shortly 
after  while  at  school  she  imitated  her  mother  by  stealing 
a  few  pennies  from  a  classmate's  pocket.  She  was  never 
discovered  and  she  never  stole  anything  else  and  soon 
thereafter,  at  the  age  of  ten  or  eleven  years,  became  a 
model  of  honesty. 

This  dream  may  be  called  a  reaction  dream  as  it  shows 
the  reverse  side  of  the  person  and  explains  that  our 
dreamer's  "terrible  honesty"  is  simply  a  reaction  to  her 
unconscious  dishonesty.  This  patient  identified  herself 
with  her  mother  in  almost  every  respect.  She  led  the 
same  life  as  her  mother  and  treated  her  husband  just  as 
her  mother  treated  her  father.  The  picture  would  have 
been  the  same  had  she  continued  to  show  a  tendency  to 
dishonesty,  but  as  this  was  repressed,  the  reaction  had  to 
be  a  scrupulous  honesty.  Like  the  character  in  Ibsen's 
"Pillars  of  Society"  she  had  "to  hold  up  the  banner  of  the 
ideal."     That  accounts  for  the  fact  that  she  often  forgot 


DREAMS  67 

to  pay,  as  she  actually  desired.  For  some  time  before  the 
analysis  of  this  dream  she  would  pay  in  advance  to  make 
sure  that  she  would  not  forget.  The  conversation  with 
her  husband  was  about  her  allowance.  She  asked  for 
more  and  he  granted  her  request.  Owing  to  the  fact 
that  she  was  at  the  time  in  love  with  another  man  her 
conscience  pricked  her  and  she  said  to  herself:  "I  am 
nothing  but  a  thief  and  I  have  no  right  to  his  money." 
This  was  the  main  determinant  of  the  dream.  After 
everything  was  analyzed  and  her  unconscious  complex 
was  laid  bare  to  her  she  was  quite  willing  to  "run  up"  a 
bill  with  me. 

Having  referred  so  often  to  symbols  in  dreams  it  will  not 
be  amiss  to  say  a  few  words  about  symbolism  in  general. 
Madeline  Pelletier  defines  a  symbol  as  "a  false  perception 
of  a  marked  relation  of  identity  or  analogy  between  two 
objects  which,  in  reality,  present  only  a  vague  analogy." 
This  definition  is  confirmed  by  the  study  of  philology. 
Primitive  writing  consisted  of  a  collection  of  symbols;  the 
Egyptians,  for  example,  used  figures  to  represent  ideas 
and  the  original  alphabet  consisted  of  a  collection  of  sym- 
bols. Thus  the  original  letter  B  did  not  stand  for  the 
consonant,  but  it  was  a  picture  of  a  crude  outline  of  a 
house  and  meant  to  represent  the  idea  "house."  With  the 
advance  of  civilization  the  alphabetic  symbols  lost  their 
original  meaning  and  became  consonants  and  vowels. 
Symbols,  therefore,  represent  a  lower  form  of  thinking  for 
they  identify  objects  which  have  only  a  very  remote, 
analogy.  Children  and  primitive  races  still  make  use  of 
this  form  of  expression.  Thus  a  child  calls  a  stick  a  horse 
simply  because  it  can  ride  on  it.    The  analogy  between 


68  PSYCHANALYSIS 

the  stick  and  the  horse  is  very  remote  indeed.  As  the 
child  grows  older  and  becomes  able  to  discriminate  and 
compare  it  no  longer  forms  such  vague  analogies.  The 
symbols  that  we  use  in  our  daily  life  though  more  complex 
and  specialized  are  symbols  none  the  less.  The  Statue 
of  Liberty,  the  cross,  the  masonic  emblems,  the  barber's 
pole,  are  examples  of  this  nature.  Language  is  full  of 
symbols.  A  symbol  is  a  form  of  short-hand  writing.  One 
word  may  express  an  idea  or  have  many  meanings,  e.g., 
the  word  "green"  may  represent  a  color  or  stand  for  the 
idea  hope.  Religion  swarms  with  symbolisms  and  the 
more  primitive  the  form  the  more  prolific  the  symbolism. 
It  has  also  been  found  that  diminished  attention  favors  a 
lower  form  of  thinking  and  that  a  disturbance  of  attention 
causes  shallow  reaction  types.  This  accounts  for  sym- 
bolization  in  hallucinations,  delusions,  dreams,  wit  and 
poetry;*  that  is,  one  is  apt  to  find  symbols  in  all  those  pro- 
ductions that  come  from  unconscious  activities.  When  we 
have  our  full  attention  and  can  compare  and  discriminate 
we  are  not  likely  to  form  any  remote  analogies.  On  the 
other  hand,  whenever  these  factors  are  disturbed  or  absent, 
as  in  dreams  and  psychoses,  and  under  certain  conditions 
even  in  the  waking  state,  we  make  use  of  symbols.  In 
this  connection  the  following  experience  related  by  an 
acquaintance  will  be  of  interest:  While  walking  with  two 
friends  their  attention  was  attracted  by  a  big  bird  in  the 
distant  height.  One  of  them  suggested  that  it  was  a  crow 
and  remarked  that  it  was  rather  unusual  to  see  this  bird 
in  the  city.     As  it  came  nearer  they  were  sure  that  it  was 

♦An  ex<  i  IK  nt  paper  on  Poetry  and  Dreams  was  published  by  Pro- 
fessor V.  C.  Prescott  in  the  Journal  of  Abnormal  Psychology,  Vol. 
VII,  1  and  2. 


DREAMS  69 

a  stray  or  escaped  eagle,  and  finally  it  turned  out  to  be  a 
flying  machine.  The  reason  for  these  mistakes  at  first  was 
the  inability  to  judge  and  discriminate,  and  had  they  left 
before  the  machine  came  near  enough  to  afford  the  oppor- 
tunity for  proper  comparison  and  judgment  they  would 
have  been  convinced  that  they  saw  a  crow  or  an  eagle. 

During  my  service  in  the  Clinic  of  Psychiatry  at  Zurich 
I  was  often  present  while  my  former  chief  Prof.  Bleuler 
examined  the  patients.  One  of  the  tests,  principally  for 
attention,  was  to  expose  pictures  very  rapidly  and  ask  the 
patient  to  tell  what  he  saw.  The  pictures  used  were  from 
a  booklet  containing  over  two  hundred  pictures,  both 
simple  and  complex,  of  everything  imaginable.  Among 
the  pictures  of  the  vegetables  was  the  asparagus,  and  when- 
ever this  was  rapidly  exposed  the  patients  almost  always 
believed  that  it  was  the  penis.  I  have  repeated  this  same 
test  hundreds  of  times  with  the  same  result.  The  patients 
are  shown  more  than  ninety  pictures  before  they  get  to 
the  picture  of  the  asparagus  and  whether  the  answers 
are  correct  or  not  they  are  usually  given  promptly.  When 
the  asparagus  is  shown  they  invariably  hesitate;  some 
give  no  answer  at  all;  their  expression,  however,  plainly 
betrays  their  thoughts.  Others  claim  that  they  have 
not  seen  distinctly  enough,  and  some  of  the  bolder  ones 
simply  laugh.  It  is  also  interesting  to  watch  their  fea- 
tures when  they  discover  the  real  picture.  Some  are  plainly 
disappointed,  others  are  very  relieved,  and,  lately,  one 
patient  exclaimed,  "I  didn't  know  I  was  so  evil-minded." 
They  all  admitted  that  they  first  thought  of  the  penis. 
Here  the  mistake  is  plainly  due  to  an  inability  to  discrim- 
inate between  two  objects  having  a  vague  resemblance, 


70  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

and  is  caused  by  insufficient  attention  owing  to  the  rapid 
exposure.  It  is  such  vague  analogies  which,  when  found  in 
dreams  we  call  symbols,  which  have  given  cause  to  so  much 
controversy.  Those  who  find  it  so  strange  should  remember 
that  we  are  not  even  pioneers  in  the  use  of  symbolism,  but 
like  in  a  great  many  other  things  we  pay  attention  to  some- 
thing which  our  opponents  never  think  worth  examining. 
Anyone  making  a  real  effort  can  find  symbolisms  in  every 
psychosis,  to  be  sure  nothing  can  be  discovered  by  super- 
ficial questioning,  as  is  sometimes  resorted  to  by  our  biased 
critics.  Besides  the  necessary  knowledge,  experience  and 
skill,  it  requires  considerable  time.  Those  who  are  too  lazy 
to  investigate  naturally  find  it  easier  to  deny  and  sneer, 
yet  symbolisms  exist.  This  fact  often  finds  corroboration 
from  convincing  sources.  In  this  connection  the  following 
quotation  from  one  who  himself  went  through  the  expe- 
rience will  be  of  interest16: 

"There  was,  however,  another  reason  for  my  frequent  re- 
fusal to  take  food,  in  my  belief  that  the  detectives  had 
resorted  to  a  more  subtle  method  of  detection.  They  now 
intended  by  each  article  of  food  to  suggest  a  certain  idea,  and 
I  was  expected  to  recognize  the  idea  thus  suggested.  Con- 
viction or  acquittal  depended  upon  my  correct  interpreta- 
tion of  their  symbols,  and  my  interpretation  was  to  be  sig- 
nified by  my  eating  or  not  eating  the  several  kinds  of  food 
placed  before  me.  To  have  eaten  a  burnt  crust  of  bread 
would  have  been  a  confession  of  arson.  Why?  Simply 
because  the  charred  crust  suggested  fire;  and  as  bread  is  the 
staff  of  life,  would  it  not  be  an  inevitable  deduction  that  life 
had  been  destroyed — destroyed  by  fire — and  that  I  was  the 
destroyer?    On  one  day  to  eat  a  given  article  of  food  meant 


DREAMS  71 

confession;  the  next  day,  or  the  next  meal,  a  refusal  to  eat 
it  meant  confession.  This  complication  of  logic  made  it 
doubly  difficult  for  me  to  keep  from  incriminating  myself 
and  others." 

Such  statements,  which  are  almost  always  found  in  the 
anamnesis  of  every  patient,  convince  one  of  the  truth  of 
symbolisms. 

That  so  many  symbolic  expressions  in  dreams  are  sexual 
is  not  at  all  surprising  when  we  consider  the  extent  of  sex 
repression  and  the  enormous  symbolization  of  sex  in  the 
waking  state.  Let  those  who  object  to  sexual  symbols  in 
dreams  reflect  for  a  moment  and  they  will  soon  find  any 
number  of  sex  symbols  in  their  own  conscious  minds.  Be- 
cause sex  is  the  strongest  impulse  we  possess  it  has  been  sub- 
jected to  constant  suppression,  and  for  that  reason  one 
finds  it  both  symbolized  and  undisguised  in  the  unconscious 
and  in  literature.  When  the  poet  says,  "And  Maidens,  be- 
coming bottles,  cry  aloud  for  corks"  (Pope — The  Rape  of 
the  Lock),  he  uses  gross  sexual  symbols  concerning  which 
there  can  be  no  mistake.  I  have  found  the  very  same  and 
similar  symbols  in  many  dreams.  In  the  unconscious  pro- 
ductions there  is  no  limit  to  sexual  symbolization.  Klein- 
paul  justly  remarked  "Man  sexualizes  the  universe."  An 
examination  of  our  colloquialisms,  stage  wit,  popular  songs, 
etc.,  will  convince  one  of  the  truth  of  this  statement.  In 
his  interesting  book,  "Ancient  Pagan  and  Modern  Christian 
Symbolism,"  Inman  says17: 

"As  civilization  advanced,  the  gross  symbols  of  creative 
power  were  cast  aside,  and  priestly  ingenuity  was  taxed  to 
the  utmost  in  inventing  a  crowd  of  less  obvious  emblems, 
which   should   represent  the  ancient  ideas   in   a  decorous 


72  PSYCHANALYSIS 

manner.  The  old  belief  was  retained,  but  in  a  mysterious 
or  sublimated  form.  As  symbols  of  the  male,  or  active 
element  in  creation,  the  sun,  light,  fire,  a  torch,  the  phallus 
or  linga,  an  erect  serpent,  a  tall,  straight  tree,  especially  the 
palm  and  the  fir  or  pine,  were  adopted.  Equally  useful  for 
symbolism  were  a  tall  upright  stone  (menhir),  a  cone,  a 
pyramid,  a  thumb  or  finger  pointed  straight,  a  mast,  a  rod,  a 
trident,  a  narrow  bottle  or  amphora,  a  bow,  an  arrow,  a 
lance,  a  horse,  a  bull,  a  lion  and  many  other  animals  con- 
spicuous for  masculine  power.  As  symbols  of  the  female,  the 
passive  though  fruitful  element  in  creation,  the  crescent 
moon,  the  earth,  darkness,  water,  and  its  emblem  a  triangle 
with  its  apex  downward,  "the  yoni,"  a  shallow  vessel  or  cup 
for  pouring  fluid  into  (cratera)  a  ring  or  oval,  a  lozenge,  any 
narrow  cleft,  either  natural  or  artificial,  an  arch  or  doorway, 
were  employed.  In  the  same  category  of  symbols  came  a 
ship  or  boat,  the  female  date-palm  bearing  fruit,  a  cow  with 
her  calf  by  her  side,  the  fish,  fruits  having  many  seeds, 
such  as  the  pomegranate,  a  shell  (concha),  a  cavern,  a  garden, 
a  fountain,  a  bowTer,  a  rose,  a  fig  and  other  things  of  sug- 
gestive form,  etc." 

To  illustrate  how  the  dream  makes  use  of  symbolisms  I 
will  cite  the  following  dreams:  A  woman  of  forty  years 
-related  this  dream:  "I  saw  my  son  L.  jammed  in  the  fire- 
place and  tried  to  get  him  out,  but  I  couldn't.  I  was  awfully 
frightened  and  called  out,  'Papa,  papa.' '  She  laughingly 
added,  "You  will  probably  find  something  sexual  in  it." 

When  the  dreamer  finds  it  necessary  to  add  such  a  re- 
mark it  is  always  well  to  think  of  the  saying,  "Many  a 
truth  is  said  in  jest."  When  I  questioned  her  about  the 
dream,  she  stated  that  "papa"  in  the  dream  did  not  mean 


DREAMS  73 

her  father  but  her  lodger,  who  is  so  nicknamed.  As  she 
could  give  no  associations  to  " fireplace"  I  took  it  to  be 
a  symbol  for  the  vagina.  The  other  facts  are  as  follows: 
This  woman  has  been  a  grass  widow  for  years  and  suffered 
much  from  lack  of  sexual  gratification.  She  was  anxious 
to  enter  into  an  amour  with  "Papa,"  but  was  deterred 
by  the  fear  of  pregnancy.  She  had  an  affair  before  and 
had  to  go  through  a  rather  bad  abortion.  Her  son  who 
was  in  the  fireplace  in  the  dream  is  nineteen  years  old. 
She  recalled  that  when  she  became  pregnant  with  him  she 
went  through  a  severe  hysterical  attack.  She  was  afraid 
of  pregnancy  and  childbirth  and  implored  her  family 
physician  to  produce  an  abortion.  He  refused  to  help 
her  so  she  herself  tried  everything  she  knew  of,  but  to  no 
avail.  The  dream,  therefore,  repeats  an  incident  of 
nineteen  years  ago.  At  that  time  her  son  was  jammed 
in  the  "fireplace"  and  she  couldn't  get  him  out.  For  the 
previous  few  weeks  she  was  occupied  with  a  similar 
situation.  She  often  said  to  herself  "if  he  (Papa)  would 
take  care,  I  would  have  nothing  to  fear."  In  the  dream 
she  actually  calls  upon  him  to  do  this,  but  the  erstwhile 
embryo  is  replaced  by  her  son  as  he  is  now. 

The  following  dream  symbolizes  a  popular  saying:  Miss  S.  dreamed 
that  she  "passed  a  very  tall  building,  from  which  smoke  came  out.  Then 
some  flames  burst  forth.     I  could  feel  the  awful  heat." 

Analysis:  Miss  S.  is  not  very  fortunate  in  love.  She  is  well  edu- 
cated, intelligent  and  good-looking,  but  a  little  too  reserved  to  suit  the 
average  young  man.  She  had  many  admirers,  but  for  some  reason  or 
other  the  eligible  man  either  failed  to  appear  or  made  little  progress 
toward  matrimony.  The  day  before  the  dream  she  visited  a  friend,  who 
jokingly  teased  her  about  T.,  one  of  her  admirers.  She  heard  that  he 
was  a  "steady  caller,"  as  she  put  it,  and  wanted  to  know  when  the  en- 
gagement would  be  announced,  and  so  on.     Miss  S.  was  embarrassed, 


74  PSYCHANALYSIS 

and  protested  that  there  was  no  truth  in  the  rumor,  that  it  was  nothing 
hut  idle  gossip.  Secretly,  however,  she  cherished  the  thought  that  T. 
might  marry  her.  The  conversation  ended  with  the  significant  remark 
from  her  friend:  "Where  there's  smoke  there  must  be  fire."  The 
dream  fulfils  her  wish.  The  very  tall  building  is  herself — she  is  very 
tall.  She  sees  the  smoke,  then  the  flames  and  can  feel  the  awful  heat. 
The  saying,  "Where  there  is  smoke  there  is  fire,"  is  simply  visualized  by 
the  dream,  and  as  the  dreamer  is  the  chief  actor  of  the  dream  she  is  the 
tall  building.  A  building  or  house,  as  is  well  known,  is  an  old  symbol 
for  the  body.*  We  often  speak  of  the  body  as  the  house  we  five  in.  Fire 
and  heat  are  symbols  of  love.  The  dream  thus  shows  that  it  is  not  mere 
gossip,  but  that  there  is  not  only  smoke  but  fire. 

This  symbolic  dream  was  brought  by  a  young  married  woman,  and 
reads  as  follows:  "Mr.  E.  sent  two  stick-pins,  one  to  my  husband  and  one 
to  my  sister,  and  I  was  angry  because  he  didn't  send  me  one.  There 
was  also  something  about  a  brush."  When  I  asked  the  patient  to  tell  me 
something  about  Mr.  E.  she  stated  that  he  was  her  husband's  friend, 
that  she  was  very  fond  of  him.  but  that  she  did  not  like  his  outspoken 
plain  way  of  expression.  Thus,  she  went  on  to  say,  "The  last  time  I  saw 
him  was  at  the  theater.  He  sat  next  to  me,  and  his  excuse  for  coming 
late  was  that  he  witnessed  a  cow  dropping  a  calf."  Being  an  over- 
modest  woman,  she  was  very  much  shocked  to  hear  him  tell  this. 
When  I  remonstrated  with  her  that  a  married  woman  ought  not  to  be 
shocked  by  such  news,  she  said  that  she  was  not  the  only  woman  tak- 
ing exceptions  to  his  way  of  talking,  and  that  although  a  perfect  gentle- 
man he  had  the  reputation  of  being  very  fond  of  the  ladies.  When  I 
asked  her  to  tell  me  about  her  sister,  L.,  she  said  she  meant  the  one 
who  married  recently  a  man  much  younger  than  herself,  who  is  a  mere 
boy.  She  then  volunteered  the  information  that  she  took  her  sister  to 
Doctor  X.  (a  well-known  gynecologist),  and  as  her  sister  does  not  think 
much  of  doctors,  she  found  it  very  difficult  to  get  her  to  go  to  a  physi- 
cian for  examination.  When  I  asked  her  what  was  wrong  with  her  sister, 
she  finally  told  me  that  she  first  suspected  pregnancy,  but  that  after 
the  examination  the  doctor  told  her  that  her  sister  was  still  a  virgin 
and  that  there  must  be  something  wrong  with  her  husband.  If  I  add 
that  her  own  husband  suffered  from  a  relative  impotence,  we  can  under- 
stand why  Mr.  E.,  who  symbolizes  the  virile  man,  sends  her  sister  and 

*  Freud:   The  Interpretation  of  Dreams,  p.  319. 


DREAMS  75 

her  own  husband  stick-pins.*  We  have  still  to  explain  the  last  part 
of  the  dream  in  which  there  was  something  about  a  brush.  When  I 
drew  her  into  conversation,  I  discovered  that  when  some  of  the  more 
interested  members  of  the  family  suspected  pregnancy  they  were  not  at 
all  pleased.  The  young  husband  was  in  no  position  to  take  care  of  his 
wife,  let  alone  of  children,  and  one  of  the  cousins,  hearing  that  she  was 
going  to  be  examined  by  a  doctor,  said  to  my  patient,  "If  the  doctor 
finds  that  she  is  in  the  family  way  get  him  to  brush  it  out."  We  can 
now  see  that  this  dream,  too,  is  a  symbolic  representation  of  hidden 
wishes,  and  how  nicely  the  associations  tell  the  story.  Mr.  E.,  the  virile 
ladies'  man;  the  reminiscence  of  the  cow  and  calf,  which  shows  that 
the  dream  deals  with  childbirth;  the  stick-pins,  which  symbolize  the 
male  member,  and  the  brush  which  stands  for  abortion,  all  these  were 
very  important  factors  in  my  patient's  life. 

The  symbolism  in  the  dream  is  the  same  to-day  as  it 
was  in  the  Biblical  times  when  Joseph  acted  the  part  of 
the  oneiroscopist,  and  as  we  still  see  it  in  the  dream  books. 
But,  whereas  the  ancients  and  the  laity  of  to-day  ignore 
their  own  subjective  mind  and  seek  interpretation 
from  magicians  and  dream  books,  we  allow  the  dreamer 
to  interpret  his  own  dreams  and  to  find  the  symbolisms 
in  his  own  mind.  What  we  do  is  simply  to  call  his  atten- 
tion to  the  different  connections  which  he  himself  generally 
cannot  see  because  of  his  own  critique,  prejudices  and 
resistances. 

We  also  differ  from  the  ancients  and  laity  by  not  seeing 
in  the  dream  the  future,  but  rather  the  past.  Yet,  in  a 
way,  the  dream  is  also  related  to  the  future  inasmuch  as 
its  fulfilled  wish  represents  what  we  are  striving  for.  This, 
in  my  opinion,  explains  the  ancient  and  modern  super- 
stition regarding  the  future  realization  of  dreams.  It 
has  its  origin  in  incidents  resembling  the  dream  of  Miss  G. 

*  For  a  similar  symbolization  of  stick-pins,  cf.  p.  235. 


76  PSYCHANALYSIS 

and  those  of  the  children  mentioned  before.  Thus  both 
children  forced  then-  parents  to  fulfil  their  wishes.  In 
order  to  appease  her  little  girl  the  mother  had  to  procure 
for  her  some  chocolate  almonds  and  the  boy  did  not  stop 
crying  until  his  mother  gave  him  the  money  of  his  dream. 
There  are  dreams  which  continue  to  manifest  themselves 
for  weeks  and  months  until  the  wish  they  contain  is 
actually  realized.  A  chronic  alcoholic  showing  delusions 
of  jealousy  disliked  a  dog  because  his  wife  "was  more 
attached  to  the  dog  than  to  him."  He  continued  to 
dream  at  different  times  that  the  dog  was  run  over,  taken 
away  by  the  dogcatcher,  etc.,  until  one  day  during  his 
wife's  absence  he  really  disposed  of  it.  Here  the  dream 
ostensibly  treated  of  the  future,  at  least  so  the  wife 
thought  on  her  return  home.  "Poor  Fido,"  she  exclaimed, 
"John  (husband)  dreamed  only  last  week  that  he  was 
caught  by  the  dogcatchers  and  now  the  dream  has  come 
true."  This  is  the  so-called  resolution  dream.18  The 
person  resolves,  perhaps  unconsciously,  to  do  a  certain 
thing  and  the  dream  continues  to  represent  it  as  realized 
until  it  is  actually  accomplished.  This  explains  the 
mechanism  of  the  "dreams  that  come  true."  I  have 
analyzed  a  number  of  such  dreams  and  all  showed  that  the 
wish  always  preceded  the  event  in  question.  Thus  one 
of  my  patients  dreamed  that  her  brother  who  lived  in 
another  city  was  dead,  and  after  relating  her  dream  to 
her  husband  received  word  that  her  brother  had  really 
died.  The  analysis  showed  that  her  brother  suffered  from 
chronic  tuberculosis  which  the  doctors  declared  fatal 
months  before.  She  was  fully  aware  of  the  gravity  of  his 
malady  and  often  thought  that  he  would  be  better  off 


DREAMS  77 

dead  than  alive.  Her  mother  lived  with  her,  but,  owing 
to  her  brother's  illness  she  stayed  with  him.  She  was 
nearing  the  end  of  a  pregnancy  and  daily  hoped  that  her 
mother  would  return  before  her  confinement.  This 
recalled  similar  experiences  of  childhood  when  her 
mother  often  neglected  her  for  the  same  brother  because 
he  was  very  delicate  and  sickly.  As  a  child  she  often 
wished  him  dead,  a  tiling  quite  common  among  children 
to  whom  the  idea  of  death  means  simply  to  be  away. 
The  conscious  wish  "he  would  be  better  off  dead  than 
alive"  became  the  dream  incitor  because  it  succeeded  in 
arousing  a  similar  infantile  wish.  For,  as  Freud  says, 
"The  conscious  wish  becomes  a  dream  incitor  only  when 
it  succeeds  in  arousing  a  similar  unconscious  one," 
and  "The  wish  as  represented  in  the  dream  must  be  an 
infantile  one."19 

The  realization  of  our  waking  dreams  shows  precisely 
the  same  mechanisms.  This  can  be  observed  not  only  in 
the  individual,  but  in  whole  races.  We  all  know  that  the 
Leitmotif  of  orthodox  Judaism  is  and  always  has  been  the 
reestablishment  of  a  Jewish  nationality,  the  "return  to 
Jerusalem";  and  should  Zionism  ever  succeed  in  obtaining 
Palestine,  the  Biblical  dreams,  the  prophecies  would  be  con- 
sidered as  having  "come  true."  Popular  language  expresses 
the  idea  in  the  saying,  "Where  there  is  a  will  there  is  a  way." 

What  was  said  of  real  dreams  is  also  true  of  artificial 
dreams.  By  artificial  dreams  we  understand  those  dreams 
which  a  person  consciously  makes  up  at  the  request  of  the 
physician.  The  patient  is  requested  to  make  up  a  dream 
by  imitating  what  he  regards  as  a  real  dream.  He  is  in- 
structed to  talk  at  random  without  guiding  his  thoughts. 


78  PSYCHANALYSIS 

The  production  obtained  in  this  manner  is  recorded  and 
analyzed  in  accordance  with  the  rules.  I  resort  to  arti- 
ficial dreams  whenever  a  patient  fails  to  bring  me  dreams, 
claiming  that  he  does  not  dream,  or  whenever  a  patient 
suddenly  stops  dreaming  because  of  some  unconscious  re- 
sistance. Analysis  of  such  a  dream  usually  brings  to  the 
surface  those  factors  which  were  at  the  bases  of  these  re- 
sistances, which  can  then  be  removed. 

These  brief  analyses  distinctly  show  the  connection 
between  dreams  and  neuroses.  I  am  quite  convinced 
that  had  we  not  analyzed  the  dream,  the  psychic  con- 
flicts underlying  the  neurosis  of  Miss  G.  could  not  have 
been  discovered,  as  they  were  unconscious  to  the  patient, 
and  that  she  would  have  merged  into  a  chronic  neurosis. 
Very  soon  after  the  complexes  were  discovered  and  brought 
to  her  consciousness  her  symptoms  began  to  disappear 
and  within  two  months  she  was  perfectly  cured.  It  must 
be  added  that  besides  analyzing  the  dream  her  other  symp- 
toms had  to  be  explained  to  her.  Thus  her  abnormal 
attachment  to  her  mother  disappeared  as  soon  as  she  be- 
came conscious  of  the  fact  that  it  was  hiding  a  repressed 
wish  that  her  mother  might  die  so  that  she  could  use  the 
estate  to  assist  Mr.  F.  The  insight  and  psychological 
education  which  she  gained  during  the  analysis  also  helped 
her  to  overcome  some  of  her  false  pride  and  prudishness, 
and  as  a  result  she  is  now  happily  married  to  Mr.  F.  Thus 
her  wish  was  realized. 

RESUME 

1 .  As  Freud  has  shown,  dreams  are  perfect  psychological 
mechanisms.  They  have  a  definite  meaning  and  contain 
a  wish  fulfilment. 


DREAMS  79 

2.  Every  psychotic  symptom  is  the  expression  of  a 
former  mental  occurrence  and  symbolically  represents  a 
wish  fulfilment. 

3.  The  repression  of  the  unconscious  is  at  the  basis  of 
both  the  dream  and  the  psychotic  symptom. 

4.  Dreams  are  the  product  of  the  unconscious  and  hence 
afford  the  easiest  access  to  the  exploration  of  the  neurosis. 

References 

1.  Sante  de  Sanctis.  Les  Maladies  mental  et  les  reves,  1897. 
Extrait  des  Annales  de  la  Societe  de  medecine  de  Gand. 

Ideler:  Ueber  die  Entstehung  des  Wahnsinns  aus  Traumen. 
Charite"  Annalen,  III,  p.  284,  1862. 

Fe>6:  A  Contribution  to  the  Pathology  of  Dreams.  Brain,  IX> 
1887. 

Lasegue:  Le  Delire  alcoolique  n'est  pas  un  delire  mais  un  reve. 
Archives  general  de  medecine,  1881. 

Sully,  J.:  The  Dream  as  a  Revelation.  Fortnightly  Review, 
March,  1893. 

2.  Freud:  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams.  George  Allan  Co.,  London, 
and  The  Macmillan  Co.,  New  York.     Translated  by  A.  A.  Brill. 

3.  Freud:  Selected  Papers  on  Hysteria  and  Psychoneurosis.  Trans- 
lated by  A.  A.  Brill,  Monograph  Series  of  Journal  of  Nervous  and 
Mental  Dis.  Co. 

4.  Jung:  The  Psychology  of  Dementia  Prsecox.  Translated  by 
Peterson  and  Brill,  Monograph  Series  Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental 
Dis.  Co. 

5.  Freud:  The  Psychopathology  of  Every  Day  Life,  Unwin,  London. 
Cf.  also  Chap.  VIII. 

6.  Cf.  Chap.  VI. 

7.  For  the  mechanism  of  jokes  cf.  Chap.  XIV. 

8.  Cf.  Chap.  III. 

9.  For  an  excellent  example  of  this  mechanism  see  Chap.  I,  p.  29. 

10.  Stekel,  W.:  Nervose  Angstzustande  und  ihre  Behandlung,  p. 
117. 

11.  Die  Diagnose  der  Homosexualitat,  Neurolog.  Zentralbl.,  1908, 
p.  338. 


80  PSYCHANALYSIS 

12.  Cf.  Chap.  VI. 

13.  Freud:  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams,  p.  234. 

14.  Papers  on  Psychoanalysis,  p.  346. 

15.  Dreams  as  a  Cause  of  Symptoms,  Jour.  Abn.  Psychol.,  Oct.-Nov., 
1910,  p.  19G. 

1G.  Beers:  A  Mind  that  Found  Itself,  pp.  39,  40,  2d  ed. 

17.  Inman:  Ancient    Pagan     and     Modern    Christian    Symbolism, 
p.  115. 

18.  Freud:  Sammlung  kleiner  Schriften  zur  Neurosenlehre,  Zweite 
Folge,  p.  59;  Deuticke,  Wien,  1909. 

19.  Freud:  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams,  p.  439. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE   ACTUAL   NEUROSES 

Neurasthenia    and    Anxiety   Neurosis;    their    Symptoms, 

Mechanism,  Etiology  and  Relation  to  the 

Psychoneuroses 

Freud  divides  the  neuroses  into  psycho  and  actual 
neuroses.  The  psychoneuroses  comprise  hysteria  and 
compulsion  neurosis  (doubts,  obsessions  and  phobias) 
while  the  actual  neuroses  include  neurasthenia  and  anxiety 
neurosis.  The  sexual  life  plays  an  important  part  in  the 
determination  of  both  classes.  But  whereas  hysteria  and 
compulsion  neurosis  are  altogether  of  a  psychogenetic 
origin,  neurasthenia  and  anxiety  neurosis  are  due  to  so- 
matic sexual  injuries. 

As  the  typical  symptoms  of  neurasthenia  Freud  men- 
tions headache,  or  pressure  in  the  head,  spinal  irritation, 
and  dyspepsia  with  flatulence,  and  constipation.  By 
adhering  closely  to  these  symptoms  one  can  easily  differen- 
tiate the  real  neurasthenia  from  the  pseudo-neurasthenias 
such  as  the  organically  determined  nasal  reflex  neurosis, 
the  neurotic  disturbances  of  cachexias  and  arterio- 
sclerosis, the  early  stages  of  progressive  paralysis,  and 
some  of  the  psychoses.  Concerning  the  etiology  Freud 
says  "Neurasthenia  always  originates  whenever  the  ade- 
quate (action)  unburdening  is  replaced  by  a  less  adequate 
6  81 


V2  P8Y'   II ANALYSIS 

one.  like  the  normal  coitus  under  the  most  favorable  con- 
ditions  by   a   masturbation  or  spontaneous   pollution."1 

Bearing  in  mind  this  symptom-complex,  neurasthenia 
ceases  to  be  the  "big  garbage  can,"  as  Forel  fitly  calls  it, 
and  becomes  a  rather  limited  entity.  For  it  is  known  to 
every  observer  in  this  field  that  neurasthenia  in  the  gener- 
ally accepted  sense  may  comprise  almost  anything  from 
anxiety  neurosis  to  psychoses  proper.  "Well  developed 
cases  of  dementia  precox,  paresis  and  other  psychoses  are 
often  diagnosed  and  treated  for  months,  even  years,  as 
neurasthenics. 

That  anxiety  plays  a  part  in  the  neuroses  was  fully 
recognized  by  almost  all  writers  on  this  subject;  but  its 
isolation  into  a  separate  entity  and  its  reference  to  a 
special  sexual  etiology  was  first  established  by  Freud  in 
his  dissertation,  "On  the  Right  to  Separate  from  Neuras- 
thenia a  Definite  Symptom  Complex  as  Anxiety  Neurosis."2 

Before  going  into  the  etiology  of  anxiety  neurosis  I  will 
first  enumerate  the  clinical  symptoms  which  are  as  follows: 

1.  General  irritability.  This  frequent  symptom  espe- 
cially expresses  itself  in  auditory  hyperesthesia  and  is  a 
frequent  cause  of  insomnia  of  which  more  than  one  form 
belongs  to  anxiety  neurosis. 

2.  Anxious  expectation  which  manifests  itself  in  an 
uneasiness  and  a  tendency  to  pessimistic  conception  of 
things,  or  in  a  tendency  to  "make  mountains  out  of  mole 
hills."  Persons  showing  this  symptom  evince  a  frequent 
tendency  to  pangs  of  conscience,  scrupulosity  and  ped- 
ant ry.  Thus  a  man  who  suffered  from  anxious  expec- 
tation thought  that  something  might  have  happened  to 
his  mot lur  because  there  was  a  thunder-storm  while  she 


THE    ACTUAL    NEUROSES  83 

was  riding  in  a  train.  He  was  anxiously  waiting  for 
news  of  some  disaster  and  was  not  relieved  until  he  heard 
that  she  had  reached  her  destination.  Anxious  expecta- 
tion is  the  most  essential  symptom  of  the  neurosis.  There 
seems  to  be  a  quantum  of  freely  floating  anxiety  which  is 
forever  ready  to  unite  itself  with  suitable  ideations. 

3.  Anxiousness  can  also  suddenly  break  into  conscious- 
ness without  being  aroused  by  the  issue  of  an  idea.  Such 
attacks  consist  either  of  the  anxious  feeling  alone  without 
any  associated  idea  they  deal  with  of  the  most  obvious 
interpretation  of  the  destruction  of  life,  such  as  ideas  of 
sudden  death  or  threatening  insanity.  The  anxious  feeling 
may  be  combined  with  a  disturbance  of  one  or  many  somatic 
functions,  such  as  respiration,  cardiac  activity,  the  vaso- 
motor innervation  and  the  glandular  activity.  The  pa- 
tient may  complain  of  "heart  spasm,"  "heavy  breathing," 
"inordinate  appetite,"  "profuse  perspiration,"  "feeling 
badly,"  etc. 

4.  The  proportion  in  which  these  elements  mix  varies 
extraordinarily,  and  any  one  accompanying  symptom  may 
constitute  the  attack.  Accordingly,  there  are  rudiment- 
ary attacks  of  anxiety  and  equivalents  for  the  attack  of 
anxiety.    The  following  equivalents  may  be  mentioned: 

(a)  Attacks  of  disturbance  of  heart  action,  ranging 
from  palpitation,  transitory  arhythmia,  with  longer  con- 
tinued tachycardia  to  grave  states  of  heart  weakness. 
These  are  not  always  easy  to  differentiate  from  organic 
heart  affections.  It  may  manifest  itself  in  pseudo- 
angina  pectoris,  a  delicate  diagnostic  sphere. 

(b)  Attacks  of  respiratory  disturbances,  many  forms  of 
nervous  dyspnoea  and  asthma-like  attacks. 


SI  PSYCHANALY8IS 

(r)  Attacks  of  profuse  perspiration,  often  nocturnal. 

(<l)  Attacks  of  trembling  and  shaking  which  may  be 
readily  mistaken  for  hysterical  attacks. 

(e)  Attacks  of  inordinate  appetite,  often  combined 
with  dizziness. 

(/)  Attacks  of  diarrhoea. 

(y)  Attacks  of  locomotor  dizziness. 

(h)  Attacks  of  congestion  embracing  also  the  so-called 
vasomotor  neurasthenia. 

(i)  Attacks  of  paresthesias  (these  are  seldom  without 
anxiety  or  a  similar  discomfort). 

(J)  Sudden  terrified  awakening. 

(k)  Frequency  of  micturition. 

(I)  Cramplike  muscular  attacks. 

5.  Nocturnal  frights  (pavor  nocturnus  of  adults) 
usually  accompanied  by  anxiety,  dyspnoea,  perspiration, 
etc.,  are  only  a  variety  of  the  anxiety  attack  and  determine 
a  second  form  of  insomnia  in  the  sphere  of  anxiety  neurosis. 
The  pavor  nocturnus  of  children  belongs  to  the  same 
neurosis. 

6.  A  prominent  symptom  of  anxiety  neurosis  is  vertigo 
which  in  its  lightest  form  may  be  designated  as  "  dizziness." 
Attacks  of  vertigo  with  or  without  fear  belong  to  the 
gravest  symptoms  of  the  neurosis.  This  form  of  vertigo  is 
neither  a  rotatory  dizziness  nor  is  it  confined  to  certain 
planes  or  lines  like  Mcnier's  vertigo.  It  consists  in  a 
specific  feeling  of  discomfort  accompanied  by  sensations 
of  a  heaving  ground,  sinking  legs,  of  the  impossibility  of 
remaining  in  an  upright  position,  and  at  the  same  time 
t  here  is  a  feeling  that  the  legs  are  as  heavy  as  lead,  that  they 
shake  and  give  way.     This  vertigo  never  leads  to  falling. 


THE   ACTUAL    NEUROSES  85 

7.  Two  groups  of  typical  phobias  develop  on  the  basis 
of  the  chronic  anxiousness  (anxious  expectation)  on  the 
one  hand,  and  the  tendency  to  vertiginous  anxiety 
attacks  on  the  other.  In  the  first  group  we  have  the 
fear  for  snakes,  thunderstorms,  darkness,  vermin,  etc., 
as  well  as  the  typical  moral  overscrupulousness  and  the 
forms  oifolie  du  doute.  The  available  fear  is  here  used  to 
strengthen  the  instinctive  aversions  implanted  in  every 
man.  The  second  group  comprises  agoraphobia  with 
all  its  accessory  forms,  all  of  which  are  characterized  by 
their  relation  to  locomotion.  The  phobia  is  usually  de- 
termined by  a  precedent  attack  of  vertigo. 

8.  The  disturbances  of  the  digestive  functions  are  few, 
but  are  characteristic.  One  often  finds  the  sensations  of 
nausea  and  sickly  feeling.  The  symptom  of  inordinate 
appetite  with  or  without  congestion  may  serve  as  a  rudi- 
mentary attack  of  anxiety.  The  tendency  to  diarrhoea 
which  is  a  chronic  alteration  analogous  to  the  anxious 
expectation  has  occasioned  the  queerest  diagnostic 
mistakes. 

9.  The  paresthesias  which  accompany  the  attacks  of 
vertigo  or  anxiety  associate  themselves  into  a  firm  sequence 
resembling  the  sensation  of  the  hysterical  aura.  These 
associated  sensations  are  changeable  and  atypical,  but 
they  sometimes  become  converted  into  physical  sensations 
like  rheumatic  pains. 

THE  OCCURRENCE  AND  ETIOLOGY  OF  ANXIETY  NEUROSIS 

In  some  cases  of  anxiety  neurosis  no  etiology  can  be 
readily  found,  but  in  such  cases  one  can  usually  find  a 
marked    hereditary    taint.     Whenever    the    neurosis    is 


Mi  PS  veil  ANALYSIS 

acquired  one  can  always  find  "that  the  ctiologically 
effective  factors  arc  based  on  a  series  of  injuries  and  in- 
fluences from  the  sexual  life."3  These  injuries  and  influ- 
ences may  be  either  found  alone  or  are  reinforced  by  other 
banal  injuries. 

To  give  a  more  precise  description  of  the  etiological 
determinants  of  anxiety  neurosis  Freud  separates  those 
occurring  in  men  from  those  occurring  in  women.  Re- 
gardless of  disposition  anxiety  neurosis  appears  in  women 
under  the  following  forms: 

(a)  As  virginal  fear  or  anxiety  in  adults.  Many  definite 
observations  show  that  an  anxiety  neurosis  almost  typic- 
ally combined  with  hysteria  can  be  evoked  in  maturing 
girls  at  their  first  encounter  with  the  sexual  problem, 
either  through  seeing  or  through  hearing  or  reading  of  sex. 

(b)  As  fear  in  the  newly  married.  Young  women  who 
remain  anesthetic  during  the  first  coitus  often  merge  into 
an  anxiety  neurosis  which  disappears  after  the  anesthesia 
is  replaced  by  normal  feeling. 

(c)  As  fear  in  women  whose  husbands  suffer  from  ejacu- 
latio  precox  or  from  diminished  potency;  and 

(d)  In  those  whose  husbands  practice  coitus  interruptus 
or  reservatus.  These  cases  go  together  for  they  only  de- 
pend on  whether  the  woman  attains  gratification  during 
coitus  or  not.  The  determinant  for  the  origin  of  the 
anxiety  neurosis  is  found  in  the  latter  case.  But  if  the 
husband  suffering  from  ejaculatio  pra^cox  can  repeat  coitus 
with  better  results  immediately  thereafter  the  wife  will 
not  merge  into  the  neurosis.  Coitus  interruptus  is  only 
injurious  for  the  wife  if  the  husband  interrupts  coitus  as 
boon  as  he  is  about  to  ejaculate  without  concerning  him- 


THE   ACTUAL    NEUROSES  87 

self  about  bringing  to  an  end  the  excitement  of  his  wife. 
If  he  waits  until  his  wife  is  gratified  the  process  has  the 
same  effect  on  her  as  normal  coitus,  but  then  he  becomes 
afflicted  with  anxiety  neurosis.  I  have  on  record  more 
than  eighty  cases  which  fully  confirm  the  above  statements. 

(e)  As  anxiety  in  widows  and  intentional  abstainers, 
often  in  typical  combination  with  obsessions,  and 

(J)  As  anxiety  in  the  climacterium  during  the  last 
marked  enhancement  of  the  sexual  impulse. 

The  forms  (c),  (d)  and  (e)  contain  the  determinants 
under  which  the  anxiety  neurosis  originates  in  the  female 
most  frequently  and  most  independently  of  hereditary 
predisposition.  The  determinants  of  anxiety  neurosis  in 
the  male  find  their  analogy  in  the  female  and  are  formu- 
lated into  the  following  groups: 

(a)  Anxiety  of  the  intentional  abstainer;  this  is  fre- 
quently combined  with  symptoms  of  defense  (obsessions, 
hysteria). 

(6)  Anxiety  in  men  with  frustrated  excitement  (during 
the  engagement  period) ;  persons  who  fearing  the  conse- 
quences of  sexual  relations  gratify  themselves  by  handling 
and  looking  at  the  woman.  These  determinants  hold  true 
also  for  the  woman  (prolonged  engagements  with  frus- 
trated excitement)  and  furnish  the  purest  cases  of  anxiety 
neurosis. 

(c)  Anxiety  in  men  who  practise  coitus  interruptus. 
This  form  of  coitus  injures  the  woman  if  practised  regard- 
less of  her  gratification,  but  it  may  also  injure  the  man  if 
in  order  to  gratify  his  wife  he  voluntarily  controls  coitus 
by  delaying  the  ejaculation. 

(d)  Anxiety  in  men  during  the  period  of  senility.     Some 


SS  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

men  go  through  a  climacterium  like  women  and  may 
merge  into  an  anxiety  neurosis  when  their  potency  dimin- 
ishes and  their  libido  increases.  This  case  and  (c)  hold 
true  for  both  sexes. 

(e)  Masturbating  neurasthenics  merge  into  anxiety 
neurosis  as  soon  as  they  stop  masturbating  as  their  former 
life  has  made  them  especially  unfit  to  lead  a  life  of 
abstinence. 

(/)  This  last  determinant  is  really  not  of  a  sexual  nature. 
Both  sexes  may  merge  into  anxiety  neurosis  through  con- 
siderable overwork,  exhaustive  exertion  such  as  sleepless 
nights,  nursing  the  sick  or  even  serious  illnesses. 

The  facts  thus  far  enumerated  go  to  show  that  in  an- 
xiety neurosis  we  deal  with  an  accumulation  of  sexual 
excitement  and  that  the  anxiety  underlying  the  mani- 
festations of  the  neurosis  is  not  of  psychic,  but  of  somatic 
origin.  Moreover,  since  it  has  been  found  that  a  whole 
series  of  cases  of  this  neurosis  shows  marked  diminution 
of  the  sexual  desire.  This  is  true  to  such  an  extent,  that  on 
revealing  to  the  patients  that  their  affliction  depends  on 
"insufficient  gratification,"  they  regularly  reply  that  this  is 
impossible  as  just  now  their  whole  desire  is  extinguished. 
All  these  indications  favor  the  assumption  "that  the  mechan- 
ism of  the  anxiety  neurosis  is  to  be  found  in  the  deviation  of 
the  somatic  sexual  excitement  from  the  psychic  and  in  the 
abnormal  utilization  of  this  excitement  caused  thereby."4 

Hence  we  see  that  the  actual  neuroses,  neurasthenia 
and  anxiety  neurosis,  differ  materially  from  the  psycho- 
neuroses,  compulsion  neurosis  and  hysteria.  The  latter 
group  arc  due  to  purely  psychogenetic  factors,  while  the 
first  are  due  to  somatic  sexual  injuries. 


THE    ACTUAL    NEUROSES  89 

I  have  pointed  out  above  that  the  characteristic  factor  of 
hysteria,  according  to  Freud,  is  the  ability  to  convert  the 
psychic  into  the  physical.  That  is,  whenever  we  find  the 
classical  symptoms  of  hysteria,  such  as  paralyses,  con- 
tractures, aphonias,  convulsions,  astasia  abasia,  etc.,  we 
deal  with  a  conversion  hysteria.  In  contradistinction  to 
this,  the  symptoms  due  to  somatic  sexual  injuries  belong 
to  anxiety  neurosis. 

It  was  found,  however,  that  no  definite  lines  could  be 
drawn;  that  besides  the  somatic  sexual  injuries  the  anxiety 
neuroses  also  showed  a  psychic  mechanism.  This  psychic 
mechanism  is  the  same  as  in  hysteria,  but  instead  of 
conversion  into  physical  symptoms  there  is  anxiety. 
"The  anxiety  is,  as  it  were,  the  only  symptom  into  which 
the  psychic  excitement  is  converted."  The  etiology,  the 
role  of  repression  and  the  psychic  processes  are  the  same 
as  in  hysteria.  For  this  new  class  of  cases  Freud  sug- 
gested the  term  "anxiety  hysteria"  and  the  whole  group 
was   first   described   by   Stekel   in   his    interesting  and 

instructive  book.5 

My  own  experience,  based  on  the  observation  of  a  great 

many  cases  of  anxiety  neurosis  taught  me  that  there  is  a 
psychic  element  in  almost  all  cases.  I  could  demon- 
strate it  in  nearly  all  my  cases  and  I  must  confess  that, 
owing  to  lack  of  opportunity  and  personal  resistances  (it 
concerned  elderly  illiterate  patients  from  clinical  dispen- 
sary practice)  I  did  not  try  hard  enough  to  ascertain  the 
true  circumstances  in  the  others.  I  can  say,  however, 
that  even  those  patients  were  cured  and  some  greatly 
benefited  by  advising  them  properly  concerning  their 
sexual  lives. 


90  PSYCHA.NALYSIS 

I  do  not  hesitate  to  advise  the  use  of  the  condom  when 
it  is  a  question  of  coitus  interruptus.  The  condom 
properly  used — lubrication  of  penis  and  moistening  or 
lubrication  of  condom  after  it  is  in  place — is  the  nearest 
substitute  for  normal  coitus. 

It  would  lead  me  too  far  afield  to  enter  here  into  a  deep 
discussion  on  the  subject  of  masturbation.  I  will  simply 
state  that  years  of  study  and  personal  investigation  have 
taught  me  that  as  masturbation  is  practically  universal  it 
cannot  be  considered  the  terrible  demon  it  is  painted  to 
be  by  some.  I  fully  agree  with  those  who  claim  that 
masturbation  does  not  in  any  way  injure  the  brain  or  cord. 
I  have  seen  many  cases  who  were  supposed  to  have  been 
harmed  by  masturbation,  but  careful  investigation  showed 
beyond  any  doubt  that  masturbation  had  no  direct  bearing 
on  the  condition  in  question.  Whatever  harm  masturba- 
tion may  do  is  mostly  produced  indirectly  by  the  constant 
struggle  which  accompanies  it.  The  patients  are  terrified 
by  reading  quack  literature  and,  I  regret  to  say,  by  some 
uninformed  doctors.  They  are  threatened  with  "paral- 
ysis," "paresis,"  "consumption  of  the  spine,"  etc.,  and  as 
a  result  they  become  depressed,  hypochondriacal  and 
self-conscious.  But  as  soon  as  they  are  convinced  that 
they  are  not  doomed  and  that  masturbation  cannot  cause 
any  insanity  or  the  other  dreadful  maladies  they  soon 
lose  most  of  their  symptoms.  Nor  must  it  be  imagined 
that  robbing  masturbation  of  its  horrors  encourages  its 
practice.  On  the  contrary,  I  found  that  as  long  as  the 
patients  dread  it  and  struggle  against  it  they  masturbate 
twice  as  often  as  when  they  become  convinced  that  it  has 
none  of  its  former  supposed  horrors.     For  it  makes  no 


THE    ACTUAL    NEUROSES  91 

difference  whether  we  occupy  ourselves  with  sex  in  a  posi- 
tive or  negative  way  the  result  is  the  same,  it  is  stimulated 
to  greater  activity.  Moreover,  many  patients  masturbate 
very  often,  because  they  are  sure  that  masturbation  caused 
an  enfeeblement  of  their  will  power  and  hence  there  is  no 
use  resisting.  As  they  become  enlightened  the  practice 
gradually  decreases,  and  as  the  patient  has  no  need  for  con- 
stantly occupying  himself  with  sexual  ideas  there  is  less  ten- 
sion to  be  removed. 

There  is  a  class  of  masturbators,  however,  who  may  be 
designated  as  chronic  because  they  continue  the  practice 
throughout  their  whole  life.  They  usually  belong  to  the 
psychopathic  type  and  the  masturbation  must  be  con- 
sidered a  result  rather  than  a  cause  of  the  condition. 

As  I  said  before  in  almost  all  these  cases  there  is  a 
psychic  element  and  when  this  is  found  we  must  not  only 
correct  the  abnormal  sexual  life,  but  to  cure  the  patient 
we  must  resort,  in  addition,  to  psychanalysis.  As  an  ex- 
ample of  an  anxiety  hysteria  of  this  type  I  will  give  the 
following  case: 

Mrs.  L.,  thirty-eight  years  old,  Austrian,  married,  having  four 
healthy  children,  was  seen  by  me  in  the  department  of  psychiatry 
in  the  Vanderbilt  Clinic  in  October,  1908.  She  complained  of  ner- 
vousness, depression,  anxiety  and  insomnia  from  which  she  suffered 
for  about  two  weeks.  On  questioning  her  I  found  that  this  was  her 
sixth  attack,  that  the  first  attack  came  on  six  years  ago  and  repeated 
itself  annually,  usually  lasting  about  two  months.  Like  the  doctor 
who  saw  her  before  me  I  thought  of  manic  depressive  insanity,  but 
on  closer  examination  I  changed  my  diagnosis  to  anxiety  hysteria. 
Her  family  history  was  negative.  She  herself  claimed  that  she  was 
never  sick  before  her  present  illness.  Anthropologically  and  other- 
wise she  corresponded  to  her  type — Austrian  Jewess.  Physically 
there  was  nothing  worthy  of  note. 


i»J  PSYCHANALYSIS 

When  I  asked  her  to  (ell  me  her  chief  complaint  she  said  that  it  was 
:i  depression  and  anxiety.     She  stated  that  her  attacks  were  not  all 
alike.     Thus,  her  fir.-t  a!t:ick  began  very  suddenly  and  was  charac- 
terized by  marked  anxiety,  depression,  apprehension  ana  insomnia. 
The  BOOOnd,  third  and  fourth  attacks  were  considerably  milder,  the 
depression   being  the  main  symptom,  while  her  fifth  attack  again 
showed   the  anxiety  and   insomnia.     Her  symptoms  did  not  in  any 
way  incapacitate  her.     She  attended  to  her  housework  as  usual  and 
there  was  absolutely  no  psychomotor  retardation.     She  maintained 
however,  that  she  was  afraid  that  something  would  happen  to  her  and 
that  she  oft  en  cried  out  without  knowing  why.     There  were  no  distinct 
phobias,  but  in  all  her  attacks  she  showed  the  characteristic  folie  du 
doute.     Thus,  during  her  attacks  she  often  got  out  of  bed  "at  least  a 
dozen  times"  to  ascertain  whether  the  door  was  properly  locked  or 
whether  the  gas  was  turned  off.     Besides  the  symptoms  enumerated 
she  also  showed  the  aforecited  cardinal  symptoms  of  anxiety  neurosis. 
What  influenced   me  in   diagnosticating  anxiety  hysteria  was  the 
typical  sexual  etiology.     The  first  attack  came  two  years  after  her 
husband  left  for  the  United  States,  during  which  time  she  was  sexually 
continent.     For  the  following  three  years,  while  with  her  husband, 
6he  gave  birth  to  two  children,  and  thus  her  emotional  needs  were  fully 
satisfied.    After  the  fourth  child  was  born  she  wanted  no  more  children, 
and  her  husband  practised  coitus  interruptus.     That  seemed  to  ac- 
count for  the  difference  in  the  symptoms  of  the  various  attacks.     For 
lack  of  gratification  is  a  very  frequent  cause  of  insomnia,  particularly 
in  persons  showing  nothing  else  to  account  for  it.     But,  of  course,  we 
have  not  accounted  for  the  depression  which  was  present  in  every 
attack. 

As  soon  as  I  decided  on  the  diagnosis  I  proceeded  with 
the  psychanalysis.  I  usually  begin  by  asking  the  patient 
to  give  me  a  full  account  of  the  origin  of  the  disease.  She 
knew  that  the  first  attack  came  on  about  six  years  before, 
just  before  she  came  to  the  United  States.  Her  husband 
1<H  her  in  Austria  with  two  children  and,  after  having  been 
away  tor  about  two  years,  he  sent  for  her  to  join  him  in  New 
York.     It  was  while  she  was  getting  ready  for  her  journey 


THE   ACTUAL    NEUROSES  93 

that  the  first  attack  came  on  and  continued  for  about  two 
months.  She  was  quite  certain  that  it  had  no  connection 
with  her  leaving  Austria;  on  the  contrary  she  was  more 
than  glad  to  join  her  husband.  The  subsequent  attacks 
came  on  periodically  every  fall.  She  also  recalled  that  her 
attacks  came  together  with  the  Jewish  fall  holidays. 
More  than  this  she  did  not  know.  I  attempted  an  associa- 
tion experiment,  but  either  she  refused  her  cooperation 
or  she  was  unable  to  grasp  the  meaning  of  the  procedure. 
As  I  attributed  her  depression  and  anxiety  to  the  repres- 
sion of  painful  or  disagreeable  reminiscences,  and  as  the 
dream  is  the  via  regia  to  the  unconscious  or  the  repression 
I  asked  her  to  tell  me  something  of  her  dreams.  She 
insisted  that  she  had  not  dreamed  for  years.  She  finally 
recalled,  however,  having  had  a  dream  before  or  at  the 
beginning  of  her  first  attack.     This  was  the  dream: 

"I  walked  on  tlie  street  and  a  horse  harnessed  to  a  wagon 
was  running  toward  me.  I  coidd  not  get  out  of  its  way;  tJie 
horse  was  almost  upon  me.  I  put  out  my  arm  to  push  it  away 
wJien  it  caught  my  hand  in  its  mouth  and  bit  me.  Screaming, 
I  awoke  terrified." 

As  the  dream  occurred  before  or  at  the  onset  of  the  at- 
tack I  assumed  that  it  had  some  relation  to  it,  as  dreams  are 
always  based  on  experiences  or  thoughts  of  the  day  pre- 
ceding the  dream.  Also,  the  fear  in  the  dream  pointed  to 
its  being  of  a  sexual  nature,  and  I  suspected  that  the  horse 
was  simply  a  sexual  symbol.6 

On  asking  the  patient  to  tell  something  about  the  horse 
she  stated  that  it  was  a  bay  horse  and  very  spirited.  That 
was  all  she  knew.  When  I  urged  her  to  tell  me  all  the 
thoughts  that  occurred  to  her  in  this  connection  she  impa- 


94  PSYCHANALYSIS 

tiently  remarked:  "I  don't  know  what  to  tell  you;  I  could 
talk  about  horses  for  hours.  I  know  quite  a  bit  about 
horses,  as  I  lived  next  door  to  a  government  horse-breeding 
Station."  She  then  displayed  considerable  emotivity, 
but  on  being  urged  to  tell  whatever  was  in  her  mind  she 
Stated  that  she  witnessed  the  practical  details  of  horse  breed- 
ing at  a  very  early  age.  Indeed,  she  was  certain  that  this 
was  her  first  conscious  sexual  impression.  "Of  course," 
she  added,  "I  was  too  young  to  know  the  real  meaning  of 
things.  I  imagined  that  the  horses  were  fighting."  This 
sadistic  conception  is  very  common  in  children  and  as 
Freud  shows  in  his  paper,  "Concerning  Infantile  Sexual 
Theories,"7  children  always  interpret  the  sexual  act  in  that 
sense.  There  was  a  sudden  blocking  and  when  asked  to 
continue  she  suddenly  recalled  something  which  had  no 
connection  with  horses.  The  evening  before  the  dream, 
while  sitting  in  the  room  with  some  neighbors,  some  ani- 
mal, perhaps  a  mouse  or  rat,  ran  out  of  the  brick  stove  into 
the  bed.  Unlike  her  sex  she  was  ordinarily  not  afraid  of 
mice  or  rats,  but  this  time  she  was  terribly  frightened  and 
continued  to  be  so  for  hours.  She  rummaged  through  the 
bed  and  found  nothing;  still  she  was  afraid  to  sleep  in  this 
bed.  This  recalled  that  this  attack  of  fright  occurred  a 
few  hours  after  an  unsuccessful  attempt  to  sell  her  feather 
beds.  She  again  became  silent  and  claimed  that  her  stream 
of  thoughts  was  exhausted.  Suspecting  that  her  attack 
of  fear  was  the  manifestation  of  a  mental  conflict  in  a  sex- 
ual abstainer,  I  asked  her  why  she  was  so  terrified  at  the 
sight  of  what  she  imagined  was  a  mouse  or  rat,  if  she  was 
ordinarily  not  afraid  of  these  animals.  Her  ready  re- 
sponse  was  that  she  was  never  afraid  of  the  real  mouse  or 


THE    ACTUAL    NEUROSES  95 

rat,  but  that  at  that  time  she  imagined  that  they  were  only 
apparitions,  that  someone  tried  to  exert  some  evil  influ- 
ence over  her  by  magic.  She  laughingly  added  that  she 
no  longer  believed  in  such  nonsense.  When  I  asked  her 
who  she  thought  tried  to  exert  an  evil  influence  over  her 
and  why  that  was  attempted,  she  at  first  refused  to  answer, 
remarking  that  the  whole  thing  was  not  worth  talking 
about,  but  after  considerable  urging  she  said  that  she  then 
believed  that  it  was  a  man  who  offered  to  buy  her  feather 
beds.  With  great  emotivity  and  hesitation  she  described 
this  man,  whom  we  will  call  X.  as  a  very  disagreeable  and 
impudent  fellow.  He  wished  to  buy  her  feather  beds,  but 
for  some  reason  she  could  not  come  to  any  terms  with  him. 
He,  however,  persisted  in  calling  on  her  until  she  became 
so  tired  of  seeing  him  that  she  hid  herself  whenever  she 
saw  him  coming.  She  suddenly  broke  off  the  narrative  and 
when  I  urged  her  to  continue  she  became  very  indignant. 
She  said  she  saw  no  reason  for  the  revival  of  all  this  foolish- 
ness; she  was  very  sure  that  this  questioning  had  nothing 
to  do  with  her  disease,  etc.,  etc.  Such  outbursts  are  very 
frequent  in  the  course  of  psychanalysis  and  always  occur 
when  we  strike  the  main  complex.8 

As  soon  as  I  knew  the  circumstances  of  the  case,  and 
after  hearing  the  dream,  I  thought  of  cliercliez  Vhomme,  and 
after  witnessing  her  emotional  outburst  I  was  sure  that  I 
had  my  man.  As  I  said  above  the  dream  showed  a  mental 
conflict  of  a  sexual  nature  and  the  attack  of  fear,  too,  as  I 
will  show  later,  symbolically  represented  a  sexual  attack. 
Indeed  the  whole  setting  was  such  that  there  was  no  doubt 
in  my  mind  that  she  had  some  sexual  experience  with  X., 
and  that  her  periodic  attacks  of  depression  merely  repre- 


96  PSYCHANALYSIS 

Bented   the  former  libido    changed    into    depression    by 

repression. 

Alter  calming  her  I  frankly  told  her  that  I  was  con- 
vinced that  she  was  concealing  something,  that  I  believed 
she  had  had  some  affair  with  X.  and  that  unless  she  told 
me  everything  I  could  do  nothing  for  her.  She  emphatic- 
ally denied  my  assumptions,  but  would  notexplain  whyshe 
had  to  hide  when  she  saw  X.  and  why  she  thought  he  tried 
to  exert  evil  influences  over  her.  She  became  very  indig- 
nant when  I  was  equally  assertive  in  my  statements  and 
left  me  rather  abruptly.  I  made  no  attempt  to  restrain 
her  or  remonstrate  with  her  because  my  experience  taught 
me  that  it  is  of  no  avail,  and  that  it  is  well  to  give 
the  patient  a  chance  to  fully  discharge  her  repressed 
emotions. 

Two  days  later  she  returned,  but  this  time  she  looked 
quite  dejected  and  penitent.  A  few  kind  remarks  from 
me  helped  her  to  disburden  herself.  Weeping,  she  made 
the  following  confession:  "Since  I  left,  you  I  was  very 
miserable.  I  have  cried  most  of  the  time;  the  whole  thing 
came  back  to  me,  I  could  not  banish  it  from  my  mind,  so  I 
decided  to  come  and  tell  you  all."  She  then  assured  me 
that  for  the  two  years  that  she  was  separated  from  her 
husband  she  had  lived  a  virtuous  life.  She  was  hardly  ever 
bothered  by  erotic  thoughts  and  had  no  difficulty  in  sup- 
pressing them  when  they  came.  While  getting  ready  to 
join  her  husband  in  America  she  sold  her  household  effects 
and  X .  wanted  to  buy  her  feather  beds.  When  she  showed 
him  the  feather  beds  he  joked  with  her  about  her  coming 
journey  to  America  and  alluded  to  her  future  happiness 
wit  h  her  husband.     This  aroused  some  erotic  thoughts  and 


THE    ACTUAL    NEUROSES  97 

when  X.  accompanied  his  talk  by  touching  her  suggestively 
she  was  surprised  not  to  have  resented  it.  In  brief,  she 
met  him  a  number  of  times,  always  on  the  pretense  of  sell- 
ing the  feather  beds  and  she  was  afterward  surprised  at  her 
own  weakness.  She,  however,  assured  me  that  she  had  not 
broken  her  marriage  vows.  "That  is  the  only  thing  I 
have  not  done,"  she  said.  It  was  after  she  suddenly  awoke 
to  the  gravity  of  the  situation  that  she  refused  to  see  him 
and  feared  him.  She  was  really  afraid  of  herself;  she  did 
not  trust  herself.  These  experiences  which  gave  rise  to  a 
number  of  erotic  thoughts  and  fancies  were  then  changed 
into  displeasure.  It  was  then  that  she  was  afraid  to  sleep 
alone  with  her  children  and  had  to  ask  a  neighbor  to  sleep 
with  her.  It  was  about  the  same  time  that  the  rat  incident 
occurred  which  made  her  think  of  magic.  This  was  due 
to  the  fact  that  even  after  she  stopped  seeing  X.  she 
continued  to  have  sexual  thoughts  and  fancies.  The  more 
she  tried  to  banish  them  the  more  they  came.  By  associa- 
tion of  ideas  they  recalled  to  her  all  her  sexual  experiences, 
such  as  early  masturbation,  etc.,  which  in  view  of  their  per- 
sistence against  her  own  will  she  could  attribute  only  to 
some  external  power — magic.  Of  course,  it  must  be 
remembered  that  there  was  a  time  in  her  life  when  she 
actually  believed  in  magical  influence,  and  owing  to  the 
mental  upset  the  repressed  complex  simply  came  to  the 
surface.  Similar  mechanisms  are  at  the  basis  of  hal- 
lucinations and  delusions.9 

The  other  mechanisms  of  the  case  are  quite  simple.  As 
I  said  above  the  nature  of  the  dream  shows  that  it  deals 
with  sexual  emotions.  We  also  showed  that  the  horse 
was  intimately  connected  with  her  first  sexual  impres- 


98  PSYCHANALYSIS 

sions.  She  also  stated  that  when  she  masturbated  later 
in  life  the  horse  often  served  to  arouse  her  sexual  fancies. 
In  the  dream  when  "the  horse  was  almost  upon  her,"  i.e., 
when  she  almost  yielded  to  temptation,  her  moral  self 
gained  the  upper  hand  and  she  "put  out  her  arm  to  push 
it  away."  She,  however,  sustained  a  scar,  her  hand  was 
bitten.  That  part  of  the  dream  is  constellated  by  the 
following  facts:  She  was  actually  bitten  by  a  horse  at  the 
age  of  six;  and  her  early  observations  of  horse  breeding 
had  often  excited  her  passions  and  induced  a  repetition 
of  her  habits.  The  same  effect  had  been  produced  in  her 
by  the  visits  of  X.  The  horse  in  the  dream  may  therefore 
,be  taken  in  this  sense  as  symbolizing  X.  who  recalls  her 
early  impressions  of  sexuality.  The  dream  often  makes 
use  of  such  symbolizations.  Gross  sexuality  is  always 
under  repression,  hence  we  see  instead  its  inrooted  associa- 
tions. Horses,  bulls,  dogs,  cats  and  chickens  are  often 
sexual  symbols  in  dreams,  because  it  is  with  these  animals 
that  children  are  first  apt  to  see  the  sexual  procedures.10 
Our  patient  conceived  sexual  relations  in  the  sadistic 
sense,  they  were  first  impressed  upon  her  in  childhood  by 
the  breeding  observations  above  referred  to.  In  brief, 
her  dream  merely  symbolizes  these  relations  as  shown  by 
the  cited  association  and  the  expression  "the  horse  was 
almost  upon  me."  The  biting,  too,  she  vividly  recalled 
seeing  while  watching  the  horses.  The  dream,  therefore, 
represents  the  hidden  fulfilment  of  her  repressed  wish, 
while  the  fear  is  the  libido  which  was  changed  by  the 
repression. 

It  still  remains  to  explain  why  the  depressions  continued 
to  recur  annually.     The  incidents  enumerated  above  took 


THE    ACTUAL    NEUROSES  99 

place  before  the  Jewish  Day  of  Atonement,  and  it  was  on 
this  day,  which  is  the  most  solemn  day  for  the  orthodox 
Jew,  that  her  actions  appeared  to  her  in  the  most  lurid 
colors.  This  is  the  day  on  which  all  true  believers  are 
inscribed  in  the  "Book  of  Life"  or  "Book  of  Death." 
It  is  a  day  of  fasting  and  confession  and  she  certainly 
had  a  lot  to  confess.  She  could  not  consider  her  sins 
forgiven,  and  dreaded  some  impending  evil,  perhaps  an 
accident  at  sea.  She  came  to  the  United  States  about 
five  weeks  later.  She  was  still  in  a  state  of  depression, 
but  it  soon  wore  off.  But  every  year,  with  the  approach 
of  this  solemn  day,  the  depression  returned.  She  merely 
celebrated  the  anniversary  of  her  painful  experience. 
She  never  recalled  the  original  episode  because  it  was  of  a 
disagreeable  and  painful  nature;  the  accompanying 
emotions,  however,  came  to  the  surface  and  constituted 
the  depression.  Such  depressions  are  quite  common,  and 
are  often  mistaken  for  manic  depressive  insanity.  I 
myself  have  seen  five  cases  of  similar  depression  within 
the  last  four  years. 

After  the  analysis  was  completed  the  patient  felt  much 
relieved  and  grateful.  I  saw  her  a  week  later  and  there 
was  not  a  trace  of  her  former  depression.  She  was  cheer- 
ful and  happy,  and  expressed  her  surprise  at  the  sudden 
disappearance  of  her  symptoms.  She  attributed  it  all 
to  a  mixture  of  rhubarb  and  soda  which  I  gave  her.  She 
has  had  no  attack  of  depression  since  then. 

This  short  analysis  teaches  a  number  of  things.  First: 
There  is  a  group  of  cases  of  periodic  depression  which  do 
not  belong  to  manic  depressive  insanity.  They  are 
anxiety  hysterias  based  on  somatic  and  psychosexual 


100  PSYCHANALY8IS 

traumata.  1  am  convinced  thai  many  cases  that  1  have 
Been  during  my  hospital  service  which  were  classified  as 
manic  depressive  Insanity  and  "depressions  not  sufficiently 
distinguished"  belong  to  this  category.  Second:  Freud's 
psychanalysis  is,  in  my  opinion,  the  only  rational  therapy 
for  such  cases,  as  it  not  only  unravels  the  hidden  mechan- 
isms, l)ut  also  removes  the  somatic  sexual  traumas,  by 
correcting  the  abnormal  sexual  life.  Third:  The  im- 
portance of  dream  analysis  need  hardly  be  emphasized. 
It  is  the  sine  qua  non  of  the  treatment. 

A  few  words  about  examining  the  patient's  psycho- 
sexual  life.  This,  of  course,  presupposed  a  number  of 
prerequisites.  Not  only  must  the  physician  himself 
be  able  to  approach  the  subject  without  prudishness  and 
lewdness,  but  he  must,  perforce,  know  something  about 
psychosexuality.  Unfortunately  there  are  very  few  men 
in  this  country  who  take  the  subject  seriously.  Most 
physicians  either  ridicule  or  scorn  those  who  have  the 
courage  to  cope  with  sexual  problems.  For  reasons  known 
to  themselves,  but  which  we  sometimes  find  in  our 
psychanalytic  work  the  word  sexuality  suffices  to  arouse 
their  righteous  indignation  and  to  cause  them  to  condemn 
everything  connected  with  it.  They  seem  to  forget  that 
besides  the  venereal  diseases  there  are  other  sexual  mala- 
dies requiring  scientific  treatment.  Whatever  is,  has  a 
reason,  and  it  is  the  duty  of  every  scientific  man  to  view 
the  cold  facts  honestly  and  fearlessly.  Much  unhappiness 
and  misery  would  be  eradicated  if  we  would  not  leave 
these  poor  sexually  distressed  victims  to  the  charlatans 
and  quacks  who  not  only  rob  them  financially,  but  add 
to  their  misery  and  often  drive  them  to  suicide. 


THE    ACTUAL    NEUROSES  101 

I  have  successfully  treated  by  Freud's  psychanalytic 
method  cases  of  homosexuality,11  psychic  impotence,  sex- 
ual anesthesia  in  women,  and  many  so-called  perversions, 
and  my  patients  and  I  feel  that  distinct  good  has  been 
done.  To  those  who  condemn  us  for  recognizing  the  sexual 
life  I  can  quote  no  fitter  words  than  those  of  St.  Augustine: 
"If  what  I  have  written  scandalizes  any  prudish  persons 
let  them  rather  accuse  the  turpitude  of  their  own  thoughts 
than  the  words  I  have  been  obliged  to  use." 

References 

1 .  Freud :  Selected  Papers  on  Hysteria  and  Other  Psych oneuroses, 
p.  149. 

2.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  133. 

3.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  141. 

4.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  148. 

5.  Stekel :  Nervose  Angstzustande  und  deren  Behandlungen,  Urban 
&  Schwarzenberg,  Wien,  1908. 

6.  Freud:  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams. 

7.  Freud :  Sammlung  kleiner  Schriften  zur  Neurosenlehre,  Zweite 
Folge,  p.  159.     Deuticke,  Wein,  1909. 

8.  Jung:  The  Association  Method.  Translated  by  A.  A.  Brill, 
American  Journal  of  Psychology,  April,  1909.     Cf.  also  Chap.  VI. 

9.  Jung:  The  Psychology  of  Dementia  Praecox.  Translated  by 
Peterson  and  Brill,  Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental  Dis.  Pub.  Co. 

10.  Ibid.,  p.  141. 

11.  Brill:  The  Conception  of  Homosexuality,  Journal  of  Amer. 
Med.  Assoc,  Aug.  2,  1913. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  COMPULSION  NEUROSES  (OBSESSIONS,  DOUBTS, 

PHOBIAS) 

Their  Relation  to  the  Sadistic  Component  and  the 
Psychology  of  Love  and   Hatred 

During  the  spring  of  1909,  the  patient  R.,  twenty-three 
years  old,  born  in  New  York  City,  of  Hebrew  parentage, 
married,  driver  by  occupation,  applied  for  treatment  in 
the  neurological  department  of  the  Vanderbilt  clinic.  He 
was  examined  by  Dr.  C.  Beling,  who,  after  discussing  the 
case  with  me,  made  the  diagnosis  "compulsion  neurosis, 
probably  paranoid,"  and  referred  the  patient  to  the  de- 
partment of  psychiatry  to  be  treated  by  me. 

R.  was  in  excellent  physical  condition.  There  was 
nothing  to  attract  one's  attention  to  him  anthropologic- 
ally; his  features  were  well  formed  and  symmetrical, 
mentally  he  was  alert  and  intelligent,  answering  questions 
readily  and  relevantly  and  his  judgment  and  reasoning 
corresponded  to  his  type — a  bright,  thoroughly  American- 
ized young  man  of  Russian-Jewish  extraction. 

According  to  the  patient  there  was  nothing  to  note  about 
his  family  history.  He  was  the  only  child  and  as  far  as 
he  could  judge  there  were  no  mental  or  nervous  diseases 
in  the  family.  His  own  life  was  not  marked  by  any 
special  events.     He  attended  the  public  school  up  to  the 

102 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  103 

age  of  fourteen  years  and  was  a  good  student.  '  After 
leaving  school  he  worked  and  then  peddled,  first  with  his 
father  and  then  alone  in  the  neighboring  farming  districts. 
His  present  position  he  had  obtained  two  years  before.  I 
will  add  here  that  upon  entering  somewhat  deeper  into 
my  patient's  symptom-complex  I  soon  became  convinced 
that  I  dealt  with  a  case  of  compulsion  neurosis  and  that 
there  was  nothing  paranoid  in  it. 

By  compulsion  neurosis  in  the  Freudian  sense  we  under- 
stand those  cases  which  present  obsessions,  doubts  and 
phobias  and  which  are  commonly  called  psychasthenias. 

The  patient  sought  treatment  because  for  four  years  he 
had  been  annoyed  by  the  thought  that  all  the  Jews  would 
be  killed  by  the  Christians.  To  use  his  own  words:  "I 
have  the  idea  that  all  Jews  will  be  killed  by  Christians.  I 
know  the  idea  is  foolish,  but  I  cannot  shake  it  off.  It  is 
always  with  me  and  at  times  is  so  strong  that  I  almost 
believe  it.  I  think  that  I  will  be  killed  because  all  Jews 
will  be  killed.  I  argue  with  myself  about  the  impossibility 
of  this  idea,  but  I  always  come  to  the  conclusion  that 
although  it  is  absurd  it  might  happen  and  this  naturally 
depresses  me.  I  begin  to  worry  and  feel  sorry  for  my  poor 
father  and  I  often  cry  over  it." 

What  the  patient  himself  thought  strange  was  the  fact 
that  he  had  absolutely  no  reason  for  such  thoughts.  He 
never  had  any  trouble  with  any  Christian.  On  the 
contrary  he  could  number  many  Christians  among  his 
friends.  He  had  been  employed  by  a  Cliristian  firm  and 
was  highly  regarded  and  the  one  person  with  whom  he 
had  some  differences  was  the  only  other  Jew  who  was 
employed  by  the  same  firm.     To  my  question  he  answered 


10!  PBTCHANALTSIS 

that  <>ii  a  few  occasions  he  had  thought  of  committing 
Buicide.  It  came  to  him  as  a  sort  of  a  command:  "You 
must  die"  But  he  argued  that  it  would  be  useless  to  do  it 
as  the  Christians  would  then  cut  up  his  body.  He  stated 
that  the  idea  came  on  suddenly  one  day  about  four  years 
before.  It  at  first  surprised  and  seemed  strange  to  him, 
but  he  soon  found  that  he  could  not  rid  himself  of  it.  He 
had  to  think  of  it  or  of  something  referring  to  it.  When 
asked  to  explain  he  said  that  he  was  always  spinning 
fancies  around  it.  He  elaborated  upon  all  sorts  of 
abstruse  questions  in  reference  to  it,  e.g.,  what  kind  of  a 
world  would  it  be  after  all  the  Jews  were  killed;  what 
would  Mrs.  X.  do;  suppose  Mr.  Z.  escapes,  etc.  As  a 
result  of  all  this  he  was  very  depressed,  had  no  ambition 
and  could  take  no  interest  in  anything. 

Besides  these  obsessions  he  complained  of  headaches  and 
a  peculiar  "dull  feeling"  which  came  on  from  time  to  time 
and  during  which  he  could  not  think.  He  also  stated 
that  he  was  very  often  suspicious.  He  feared  that  some 
one  would  make  remarks  to  him.  This  only  occurred  to 
him  when  he  visited  a  public  urinal. 

We  see  then  that  the  main  feature  of  the  case  is  the 
obsessive  thinking.  The  only  detail  that  would  lead  one 
to  think  of  paranoia  is  the  suspicion  in  public  urinals. 

In  his  observation  on  the  defense-neuropsychoses,  Freud 
describes  the  essence  and  mechanism  of  compulsion  nerurosis 
as  follows:1  "Sexual  experiences  of  early  childhood  play 
the  same  part  in  the  etiology  of  the  compulsion  neurosis 
as  in  hysteria,  but  whereas  the  latter  is  characterized  by 
pa  ivity  the  former  is  noted  for  its  aggression  or  sexual 
activity.    The  essence  of  the  compulsion  neurosis  may  be 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  105 

expressed  in  the  following  formula:  Obsessions  are  always 
transformed  reproaches  returning  from  repression  which  always 
refer  to  a  pleasurably  accomplished  sexual  action  of  childhood. 
The  typical  course  of  compulsion  neurosis  is  as  follows :  The 
first  period,  or  the  period  of  childish  immorality,  contains  the 
germs  for  the  later  neurosis.  There  is  at  first  a  sexual 
seduction  which  later  makes  the  repression  possible. 
This  is  followed  by  the  actions  of  sexual  aggressions 
against  the  other  sex  which  later  manifest  themselves  as 
actions  of  reproach.  This  period  is  brought  to  an  end  by 
the  appearance  of  the — often  self  ripened — sexual  matur- 
ity. A  reproach  then  attaches  itself  to  the  memory  of 
that  pleasurable  action  and  the  connection  with  the 
initial  experience  of  passivity  makes  it  possible — only 
after  conscious  and  recollected  effort — to  repress  it  and 
replace  it  by  the  primary  symptom  of  the  defense.  The 
third  period,  that  of  apparent  healthiness,  but  really  of 
successful  defense,  begins  with  the  symptoms  of  scrupu- 
lousness, shame  and  diffidence.  The  next  period  of  the 
disease  is  characterized  by  the  return  of  the  repressed 
reminiscences,  i.e.,  by  a  failure  of  the  defense.  But  the 
revived  reminiscences  and  the  reproaches  formed  from 
them  never  enter  into  consciousness  unchanged.  Instead, 
compromise  formations  between  the  repressed  and  re- 
pressing ideas  become  conscious  as  an  obsession  and  ob- 
sessive affect  and  substitute  the  pathogenic  memory  in  the 
conscious  life.  In  the  further  course  of  the  disease, 
depending  on  whether  the  memory  content  of  the  reproach- 
ful action  alone  forces  an  entrance  into  consciousness  or 
whether  it  takes  with  it  the  accompanying  reproaching 
affect,  we  may  have  two  forms  of  the  neurosis.     The  first 


100  PSYCHANALYSIS 

represents  the  typical  obsession,  the  content  of  which 
attracts  the  patient's  attention.  Only  an  indefinite 
displeasure  is  perceived  as  an  affect,  whereas  for  the 
content  of  the  obsession  the  only  suitable  affect  would  be 
one  of  reproach.  The  second  form  of  compulsion  neurosis 
results  if  the  repressed  reproach  and  not  the  repressed 
memory  content  forces  a  replacement  in  the  conscious 
psychic  sphere.  The  affect  of  the  reproach  can  change 
itself  into  any  other  affect  of  displeasure,  and  if  this  occurs 
there  is  nothing  to  hinder  the  substituting  affect  from 
becoming  conscious.  Thus  the  reproach  (of  having 
performed  in  childhood  some  sexual  actions)  may  be 
easily  transformed  into  shame  (lest  someone  becomes 
aware  of  it),  into  social  fear  (fearing  punishment  from 
others),  into  delusions  of  observation  (fear  of  betraying 
those  actions  to  others),  into  fear  of  temptation  (justified 
distrust  in  one's  own  ability  to  resist),  etc.  Moreover, 
the  memory  content  of  the  reproachful  action  may  also 
be  represented  in  consciousness,  or  it  may  be  altogether 
concealed,  which  makes  diagnosis  very  difficult.  Many 
cases  of  the  so-called  "  periodic  neurasthenia  "  or  "  periodic 
melancholia"  may  be  explained  by  compulsive  affects. 

Besides  these  compromise  symptoms  which  signify  a 
return  of  the  repression  and  hence  a  failure  of  the  origin- 
ally achieved  defense,  the  compulsion  neurosis  forms  a 
series  of  other  symptoms  of  a  totally  different  origin. 
The  ego  really  tries  to  defend  itself  against  those  descend- 
ants of  the  initial  repressed  reminiscences,  and  in  this  con- 
flict of  defense  symptoms  are  produced,  which  may  be 
designated  as  "secondary  defense."  These  are  altogether 
protective   measures,  which  have  performed   good   service 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  107 

in  the  struggle  carried  on  against  the  obsession  and  the 
obsessing  affects.  If  these  helps  in  the  conflict  of  the 
defense  really  succeed  in  repressing  anew  the  symptoms 
of  return,  obtruding  themselves  on  the  ego,  the  compulsion 
then  transmits  itself  to  the  protective  measures  them- 
selves and  produces  a  third  form  of  the  compulsion  neu- 
rosis, the  compulsive  actions.  These  are  never  primary. 
They  never  contain  anything  else  but  a  defense,  never  an 
aggression.  Despite  their  peculiarity  they  can  always 
be  fully  explained  by  reduction  to  the  compulsive  remin- 
iscences which  they  oppose. 

The  secondary  defense  of  the  obsessions  can  be  brought 
about  by  a  forcible  deviation  to  other  thoughts  of  possibly 
contrary  content;  hence  in  a  case  of  success  there  is 
compulsive  reasoning  concerning  abstract  and  trans- 
cendental subjects,  because  the  repressed  ideas  always 
concern  themselves  with  the  sensuous,  or  the  patient 
tries  to  become  master  of  every  compulsive  idea  through 
logical  labor  and  by  appealing  to  his  conscious  memory. 
This  leads  to  compulsive  thinking  and  examination  and 
to  doubting  mania.  The  priority  of  the  perception 
before  the  memory  in  these  examinations  at  first  induce 
and  then  force  the  patient  to  collect  and  preserve  all 
objects  with  which  he  comes  in  contact.  The  secondary 
defense  against  the  compulsive  affects  results  in  a  greater 
number  of  defensive  measures  which  are  capable  of  being 
transformed  into  compulsive  action.  These  can  be  grouped 
according  to  their  tendency.  We  may  have  acts  of  peni- 
tence (irksome  ceremonial  and  observation  of  numbers), 
of  prevention  (diverse  phobias,  superstitions,  pedantry, 
aggravation  of  the  primary  symptom  of  scrupulousness), 


108  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

acts  of  fear  of  betrayal  (collecting  papers  and  shyness), 
and  acts  of  becoming  unconscious  (dispomania).  Among 
these  compulsive  acts  and  impulses  the  phobias  play  the 
greatest  part  as  limitations  of  the  patient's  existence." 

Let  us  now  return  to  our  patient  and  see  in  how  far  he 
agrees  with  the  description  just  read.  Bearing  in  mind 
Freud's  dictum  that  no  neurosis  is  possible  in  a  normal 
vita  sexualis,  I  naturally  made  a  thorough  examination  of 
the  pat  ient's  psychosexual  development.  As  usual  in  such 
examinations  his  answers  were  monosyllabic  and  evasive 
and  all  that  I  could  elicit  was  that  he  was  perfectly  well 
sexually  until  the  age  of  fifteen  or  sixteen  years  when  he 
began  to  masturbate.  He  began  to  consort  with  women 
at  eighteen  years,  but  indulged  rarely.  He  admitted  that 
his  marriage  was  not  a  happy  one,  but  stated  that  his 
sexual  life  was  normal.  Previous  to  marriage  he  went 
through  many  conflicts.  He  was  afraid  that  masturbation 
would  drive  him  crazy  and  therefore  stopped  it,  but  he 
then  began  to  suffer  from  frequent  pollutions  which  worried 
him  a  good  deal.  He  entertained  the  usual  hypochon- 
driacal ideas  of  the  masturbator.  He  seemed  to  be  un- 
willing to  tell  me  anything  else  and  I  did  not  urge  him. 
I  was  sure  that  there  was  abundant  material  and  that 
he  wrould  tell  it  to  me  sooner  or  later.  In  the  course  of 
psychanalysis  we  often  come  to  what  seems  a  stone  wall. 
The  patient  has  nothing  to  tell  us  and  he  does  not 
•  1  ream.  This  is  only  a  form  of  resistance  which  the 
experienced  psychanalysist  must  know  how  to  break. 

As  the  character  of  a  person  represents  the  reaction 
formations  of  his  latency  period  it  is  always  wise  to  exam- 
ine these  reactions  especially  those  that  are  accentuated, 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  109 

and  as  our  patient  seemed  to  be  very  shy — he  never  looked 
me  in  the  face  while  talking — I  asked  him  if  he  was  un- 
usually bashful.  To  my  surprise  he  answered  that  bash- 
fulness  or  shame  was  responsible  for  his  obsession.  He 
stated  that  he  had  been  abnormally  bashful  and  shy  since 
he  was  twelve  years  old.  This  was  especially  noticeable 
when  he  was  in  the  presence  of  women.  A  few  years  be- 
fore he  became  acquainted  with  a  young  lady  who  invited 
him  to  call.  He  was  very  anxious  to  do  so,  but  was  too 
shy  and  bashful  to  accept  her  invitation.  The  following 
morning  while  half  awake  he  noticed  that  he  was  not  bash- 
ful. This  gave  him  the  idea  that  if  he  could  remain  in  a 
half  waking  state  he  would  not  be  bashful.  He  remained 
in  this  state  for  two  days,  when  he  suddenly  began  to 
think  of  Jews  and  Christians  and  later  of  the  obsession* 
This  half  waking  state  was  simply  a  secondary  defense 
against  a  painful  idea.  The  neuroses  make  prolific  use  of 
such  mechanisms.  Thus  many  dipsomanias  are  nothing 
but  flights  from  consciousness  or  means  of  becoming  un- 
conscious. I  had  occasion  to  analyze  two  female  patients 
who  were  subject  to  screaming  spells.  They  had  to  scream 
apparently  without  any  provocation.  Analysis  showed 
that  the  screaming  was  merely  a  flight  from  a  painful  thought. 
With  their  screaming  they  drowned  their  inner  painful  and 
disagreeable  voices.  Many  hysterical  fainting  spells  show 
the  same  mechanism.  Our  patient  merged  into  a  semi- 
stuporous  state  not  only  to  escape  from  the  abnormal  bash- 
fulness,  but  from  those  thoughts  which  caused  this  reaction. 
This  revelation  threw  no  light  on  the  subject.  From 
the  nature  of  the  obsession  and  the  patient's  extreme 
devotion  to  his  parents,  especially  the  father,  I  at  once 


110  PSYCHANALYSIS 

surmised  that  there  was  probably  a  strong  repressed 
sadistic  component  and  that  the  pronounced  abnormal 
bashfulness  could  only  be  looked  upon  as  a  transformed 
reproach  of  sexual  acts  in  childhood.  On  going  more 
deeply  into  the  infantile  sexuality  I  discovered  the  follow- 
ing facts:  R.  was  an  only  child  and  therefore  received  more 
than  the  usual  amount  of  love  from  his  parents.2  He  was 
idolized  by  both  parents,  especially  by  his  mother  with 
whom  he  slept  almost  constantly  until  the  age  of  four 
years.  This  was  favored  by  the  fact  that  his  father's 
business  necessitated  his  remaining  away  from  home  for 
long  periods.  At  that  age  something  happened  which 
changed  his  mother's  attitude  toward  him.  The  patient 
attempted  something  of  a  sexual  nature  with  a  little  girl 
with  whom  he  played  on  the  roof  and  was  severly  punished 
for  it  by  the  girl's  and  his  own  mother.  The  latter  be- 
came very  severe  with  him.  She  allowed  him  to  sleep 
with  her  but  kept  him  at  a  distance.  He  felt  this  very 
keenly  and  cried  in  silence,  but  said  nothing.  The  mother 
instinctively  reproached  herself  for  the  son's  sexual  pre- 
maturity. By  giving  him  too  much  affection  she  awak- 
ened and  kept  alive  his  infantile  sexuality  which  then  in- 
cited him  to  attempt  with  the  little  girl  what  his  own 
mother  innocently  permitted.  The  estrangement  from  his 
mother  strengthened  his  attachment  for  his  father  and  as 
the  latter  was  rarely  at  home  and  made  a  great  fuss  over 
him  whenever  he  returned  that  feeling  continued  for  some 
time.  The  boy  was  very  happy  when  his  father  returned 
and  cried  bitterly  when  he  left  home.  It  would  seem  that 
1  lie  latency  period  did  not  progress  in  the  normal  manner 
for  the  patient  recalled  many  instances  of  sexual  aggres- 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  111 

sion  and  a  homosexual  experience  with  two  adults.  At 
the  age  of  from  six  to  seven  years  he  was  self-willed,  wild 
and  very  revengeful.  He  evinced  a  special  cruelty  to  ani- 
mals and  was  happy  when  he  could  kill  a  bird  or  kick  a 
cat.  One  of  his  favorite  pastimes  was  to  wring  the  necks 
of  chickens  or  to  stuff  up  their  nasal  openings  with  wax 
and  hold  their  beaks  until  they  suffocated. 

We  now  come  to  the  age  of  puberty.  The  patient 
recalled  that  at  the  age  of  nine  years  he  was  very  inquisi- 
tive sexually  and  would  look  under  girls'  dresses  whenever 
he  could.  At  twelve  years  a  man  attempted  to  have 
sexual  relations  with  him,  but  he  refused.  Soon  there- 
after he  became  shy  and  abnormally  bashful.  From 
twelve  to  fifteen  years  there  were  no  sexual  experiences 
to  note.  It  may  be  called  a  deferred  latency  period.  At 
fifteen  he  played  with  little  girls  and  about  the  same  time 
began  to  masturbate.  When  he  was  about  sixteen,  while 
peddling  in  the  farming  districts  he  began  to  exhibit  in 
the  presence  of  women.  He  claimed  that  this  action 
gave  him  a  "strange  pleasant  feeling."  At  the  age  of 
seventeen  he  began  to  practise  active  pederasty  with  a 
boy  of  thirteen  which  continued  for  about  a  year  once 
every  three  weeks.  At  eighteen  he  began  to  consort 
with  women,  but  with  the  exception  of  a  few  experiences 
he  led  a  continent  life  until  he  was  married  at  twenty-two 
years.  Since  the  birth  of  his  child  he  had  practised  coitus 
interruptus.  His  married  life  did  not  seem  to  influence 
his  neurosis.  He  stated  that  he  was  especially  annoyed 
by  his  obsession  during  the  marriage  ceremony,  and  that 
although  the  obsession  was  not  so  strong  during  the  first 


1 12  PSYCHANALYSIS 

year  of  his  married  life  it  soon  resumed  its  former  com- 
pulsiveness  and  constancy. 

The  fads  thai  I  have  thus  farobtained  did  not  comeout 
as  smoothly  as  you  might  imagine.  It  was  a  constant 
struggle  with  enormous  unconscious  and  conscious 
resistances,  the  overcoming  of  which  required  much  effort 
and  patience  and,  I  might  add,  skill.  But  the  patient 
soon  became  interested  in  the  work  and  as  the  resistances 
were  broken  he  spoke  freely  about  his  abnormal  sexual 
life. 

As  has  been  stated  before  we  make  use  of  dream  inter- 
pretation, for  the  dream  is  the  via  regia  to  the  unconscious. 
At  my  request  the  patient  brought  me  his  dreams.  It  was 
through  these  dreams  that  I  discovered  most  of  the  details 
enumerated  above.  To  show  how  the  dream  gives  us  in- 
formation I  will  cite  a  dream  which  he  brought  about  four 
months  after  the  beginning  of  the  analysis.  It  read  as  fol- 
lows: "I  passed  a  store  and  saw  a  mad  dog,  a  cat  and  a  goat. 
A  crowd  was  watching  them.  I  said  to  somebody,  'It  is  a 
wonder  that  they  let  that  mad  dog  bite  the  horse.'  Just  tlien  a 
policeman  began  to  shoot  at  the  mad  dog.  He  fired  six  shots, 
but  missed  it.  The  policeman  then  got  in  the  window  and  ivas 
going  to  take  the  mad  dog  to  the  lock-up,  and  it  looked  something 
like  a  horse  and  then  it  was  a  man."  While  still  half  asleep 
he  said  to  himself  "  I  must  write  that  down  for  the  doctor!" 

To  one  who  knows  the  language  of  the  unconscious  this 
dream  tells  many  things.  The  appendix  to  the  dream 
"  I  must  write  that  down  for  the  doctor"  very  often  occurs 
in  dreams  in  the  course  of  psychanalysis  and  regularly 
corresponds  to  a  great  resistance  to  the  confession 
involved  in  the  dream  and  is  frequently  followed  by  the 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  113 

forgetting  of  the  dream.  It  also  means  that  the  dreamer 
decided  not  to  tell  anything  about  it  to  the  doctor.  This 
was  also  confirmed  by  the  crowd  in  the  dream  which 
signifies  a  secret.  As  the  dreamer  himself  is  always  the 
principal  actor  in  the  dream  I  concluded  that  he  must  be 
concealed  under  the  mad  dog.  This,  too,  is  confirmed 
by  the  fact  that  the  mad  dog  later  became  transformed 
into  a  man.  But  as  the  dog  was  also  a  horse,  there  must 
be  some  community  between  the  horse  and  the  dog  and 
the  man.  The  nature  of  the  dream  shows  that  it  is  of  a 
sexual  nature.3  When  I  asked  him  to  tell  me  what  the 
policeman  brought  to  his  mind  he  finally  recalled  a  rather 
disagreeable  reminiscence.  At  the  age  of  fifteen  he  was 
in  the  habit  of  taking  little  girls  on  his  lap  and  on  the 
pretence  of  playing  with  them  he  masturbated.  On  one 
of  these  occasions  in  the  Bronx  Park  he  was  suddenly 
detected  by  a  policeman  who  ran  after  him  and  threatened 
to  shoot  him.  Animals  in  dreams  are  usually  sexual 
symbols  and  as  he  could  give  no  associations  I  was  con- 
vinced that  there  must  have  been  something  between 
him  and  the  animals  of  a  sexual  nature.  These  are  no 
arbitrary  deductions,  but  they  are  based  on  psychological 
facts  which  all  who  are  interested  can  find  in  Freud's 
"The  Interpretation  of  Dreams."  I  did  not  hesitate  to 
tell  him  my  conclusions,  and  after  enormous  resistance 
and  great  emotivity  he  admitted  that  he  was  guilty  of 
bestiality  with  the  horse,  dog  and  sheep.  This  occurred 
while  he  was  peddling  in  the  farming  districts,  between 
the  ages  of  seventeen  and  eighteen.  It  was  not  a  case  of 
erotic  zoophilia,  as  he  has  not  resorted  to  such  practises 

8 


114  PSYCHANALYSIS 

since.  It  was  simply  a  case  of  faut  de  micux  in  a  sexually 
hyperesthetic  and  very  bashful  boy. 

Without  going  mto  any  detailed  comparisons,  I  will  simply 
state  that  a  study  of  our  patient's  psychosexual  life  shows 
that  it  agrees  in  every  particular  with  what  I  have  quoted 
above  (p.  23)  from  Freud  concerning  the  development  of  the 
normal  and  abnormal  sexual  life  from  the  polymorphous 
perverse  infantile  sexuality.  Let  us  now  see  how  this  corre- 
sponds with  the  patient's  compulsive  idea. 

When  I  first  heard  the  principal  obsession,  viz.,  that 
all  the  Jews  will  be  killed  by  the  Christians,  I  was,  perforce, 
reminded  of  such  personages  as  Catherine  de  Medici  and 
Gil  de  Rais.  I  was  struck  by  the  idea  of  such  unheard-of 
wholesale  slaughter,  and  remembering  that  the  symptom 
represents  the  whole  or  a  partial  sexual  manifestation  of 
the  patient  from  the  sources  of  the  normal  or  perverse  par- 
tial impulses  of  sexuality,  I  naturally  thought  that  there 
must  be  a  marked  sadistic  component  in  the  patient's  psy- 
chosexuality.  As  I  have  shown  above,  my  assumption  was 
fully  confirmed.  Further  investigations  of  the  causes  of 
the  obsession  in  mature  life  brought  out  the  fact  that  it 
appeared  suddenly  at  about  the  age  of  twenty  while  the 
patient  was  seriously  thinking  of  marrying,  and  just  after 
getting  over  an  unhappy  love  affair.  This  amour  wras 
with  the  daughter  of  a  farmer  whose  acquaintance  he 
made  while  traveling  near  her  home.  He  was  very  fond  of 
the  girl  and  wrould  have  married  her  but  for  his  father  who 
would  not  hear  of  his  marrying  a  Christian.  His  father 
played  a  peculiar  part  in  R.'s  life.  There  was  a  constant 
struggle  of  the  two  contrary  feelings  of  love  and  hatred. 
Paradoxical  as  it  may  seem,  he  hated  him  as  intensely  as 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  115 

he  loved  him.  The  continued  existence  of  such  contrasts  is 
possible  only  under  special  psychic  determination  and  with 
the  help  of  the  unconscious  state.  We  know  that  the  con- 
trasting feelings  of  love  and  hatred  can  be  readily  enter- 
tained in  reference  to  indifferent  persons.  Thus,  a  clerk 
may  think  that  his  superior  is  an  excellent  executive  man, 
but  an  unscrupulous  lawyer.  But  when  it  concerns  some 
one  nearer  to  us,  let  us  say  a  wife  or  parent,  we  strive  for  a 
single  feeling  and  we  therefore  overlook  the  faults  which 
may  provoke  displeasure.  But  the  love  does  not  extin- 
guish the  hatred.  It  merely  represses  it  into  the  uncon- 
scious where  it  is  kept  from  destruction  and  may  even  grow 
in  intensity.4  The  determinant  of  this  peculiar  constel- 
lation of  love  lies  in  the  separation  of  these  contrasting 
feelings  and  a  repression  of  one — usually  the  hatred — at  a 
very  early  age.  As  a  preliminary  explanation  of  the  com- 
pulsion neurosis,  Freud  states  that  the  sadistic  component 
of  loVe  was  especially  strongly  developed  constitutionally 
in  those  cases  of  unconscious  hatred  and  for  that  reason 
they  were  subjected  to  a  premature  and  thorough  suppres- 
sion. The  phenomena  of  the  neurosis,  then,  take  their 
origin  on  the  one  hand  from  the  conscious  attachment 
which  comes  to  the  surface  through  reaction  and  on  the 
other  hand  from  the  unconscious  sadism  in  operation.  If 
we  review  the  patient's  relation  to  his  father  we  find  that  at 
an  early  age  he  was,  as  it  were,  his  rival.  Whenever  the 
father  was  home  he  had  to  renounce  many  pleasures,  such 
as  sleeping  with  his  mother.  Later  on  when  his  mother 
changed  her  attitude  toward  him  he  became  very  attached 
to  his  father,  but  he  often  had  occasion  to  hate  him  be- 
cause he  often  punished  him.     As  he  grew  older  these  feel- 


116  ,U  II ANALYSIS 

ings  were  intensified  by  the  fact  that  his  father  was  an 
orthodox  .lew  and  lie  wanted  to  be  an  American.  He  was 
ashamed  to  be  seen  with  his  father  because  the  street 
urchins  made  derogatory  remarks  about  him.  They  called 
him  Jew  and  Sheeny.  He  himself  often  applied  the  same 
epithets  to  him,  which  was  naturally  followed  by  a  re- 
proach and  an  outburst  of  affection.  When  his  father 
opposed  his  marriage  with  the  Christian  the  old  rivalry 
was  revived.  His  father  again  stood  in  his  way  of  attain- 
ing his  sexual  object.  Just  as  he  kept  him  away  from  his 
mother  during  childhood  so  he  now  prevented  him  from 
marrying.  His  feeling  for  the  girl  was  also  characterized 
by  the  contrasts  of  love  and  hatred,  but  whereas  this  was 
largely  a  conscious  perception,  his  former  intense  con- 
scious hostility  toward  his  father  escaped  him  long  ago 
and  could  only  be  brought  to  consciousness  in  the  face  of 
the  most  violent  resistance.  This  was  especially  favored 
by  his  long  abstinence  and  recent  love  which  thus  helped 
to  enhance  his  libido  and  to  take  up  again  the  old  struggle 
against  the  authority  of  the  father.  We  may  say  that 
the  repression  of  the  infantile  hatred  toward  his  father 
gave  rise  to  all  further  happenings  of  the  neurosis.  While 
he  was  wavering  between  his  father  and  his  beloved  and 
escaped  from  conscious  reflection  by  merging  into  a  semi- 
stuperous  state,  he  was  one  day  attracted  by  the  big  red 
head  lines  of  a  newspaper  about  the  massacre  of  the  Jews 
in  Russia.  As  his  father  was  a  Russian  Jew  a  thought 
something  like  the  following  suddenly  flashed  through  his 
mind:  "If  my  father  were  only  there!"  which  may  be  com- 
pleted "he  would  be  killed  and  I  could  marry  a  Christian;" 
but  this  conscious  perception  was  naturally  at  once  sup- 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  117 

pressed.  A  few  days  later  he  began  to  compare  notes 
about  Jews  and  Christians  which  finally  developed  into 
the  obsession  "All  Jews  will  be  killed  by  Christians." 
In  other  words  the  whole  process  followed  the  well-known 
mechanism  of  projection,  i.e.,  an  inner  perception  is  sup- 
pressed and  as  a  substitute  its  content  comes  into  con- 
sciousness as  a  perception  from  without  after  it  has  under- 
gone some  distortion.  The  distortions  are  effected  in  the 
same  way  as  in  dreams,  i.e.,  by  substitution,  displacement, 
inversion,  ellipses,  etc.  Here  it  was  not  a  real  distortion, 
but  rather  a  generalization  which  is  a  common  mechanism 
of  obsessions.5 

After  this  analysis  the  obsession  from  which  the  patient 
had  suffered  for  about  four  years  and  which  had  caused 
him  untold  misery  soon  disappeared.  The  treatment 
lasted  for  about  four  months,  during  which  I  saw  the 
patient  at  first  three  times  a  week,  then  twice  and  once  a 
week.  We  usually  spent  an  hour  at  each  session.  The 
patient  was  by  no  means  cured.  There  was  still  much  to 
be  done.  Thus  his  homosexual  component  had  to  be  dealt 
with.*  After  eight  months  treatment  I  discharged  him 
as  cured.  Since  then  he  has  become  more  ambitious. 
He  gave  up  his  position  as  driver  and  is  now  the  owner 
of  a  well  paying  business. 

The  analysis  of  this  case  fully  confirms  Freud's  assertion 
that  a  special  aggressive  activity  in  childhood  is  char- 
acteristic of  the  later  compulsion  neurosis.  This  activity 
manifests  itself  preponderate^  in  an  intensive  occupation 
with  the  desire  for  looking  and  knowing.     The  rich  and 

*  Analysis  showed  that  his  suspicion  in  public  urinals  was  due  to  a 
repressed  wish  to  exhibit  in  order  to  attract  those  near  him. 


1 18  PSYCHANALYSIS 

active  emotional  life  of  childhood  helps  to  develop  pro- 
fusely the  feelings  of  love  and  hatred  toward  parents, 
or  sisters  and  brothers,  which,  in  addition  to  the  curiosity 
concerning  sex  and  birth,  forms  the  central  complex  of 
the  neurosis.  One  always  finds  in  the  symptom  forma- 
tion of  compulsion  neurosis  a  continuous  struggle  between 
love  and  hatred  for  the  same  person,  and  as  we  said  above 
such  feeling  is  only  possible  under  special  psychic 
determinations.  The  following  case  demonstrates  some  of 
these  factors:* 

A  young  man  of  twenty-three  years  had  been  suffering  from  a  very 
severe  compulsion  neurosis  since  his  boyhood.  He  was  obsessed  with 
a  great  many  very  bizarre  obsessions,  a  number  of  which  dealt  with 
the  idea  of  death.  For  years  he  had  to  argue  for  hours  and  some- 
times for  days  about  the  idea  of  "killing  time."  Some  of  the  ob- 
sessive thoughts  ran  as  follows:  "Am  I  accomplishing  anything  in  my 
work,  or  am  I  only  killing  time?"  "Is  Mr.  X.  (a  prominent  architect) 
getting  the  pleasure  out  of  his  work,  or  is  he  only  killing  time?"  "What 
is  the  use  of  doing  anything  if  you  are  only  killing  time?" 

When  he  was  invited  into  society  he  at  once  began  to  argue  about 
killing  time.  During  his  visits  with  me  he  would  often  implore  me  to 
stop  the  analysis  and  answer  some  of  his  questions  about  killing  time. 
He  wanted  to  know  whether  I  enjoyed  my  work,  or  if  I  was  only  killing 
time.  One  of  his  oft-repeated  questions  was:  "Do  people  really  enjoy 
living,  or  are  they  only  killing  time  for  want  of  something  to  do?" 
In  the  characteristic  manner  of  this  disease  he  formed  the  strangest 
sort  of  combinations  about  this  obsessive  thought.  The  patient  was 
with  me  for  months,  and,  though  he  made  much  progress,  I  was  help- 
less when  it  came  to  this  obsession.  A  number  of  times  I  felt  sure  that 
I  had  found  the  solution,  but  while  he  was  perfectly  willing  to  accept 
what  I  said,  the  obsession  continued  unabated,  until  one  day  when  I 
analyzed  one  of  his  dreams  in  which  an  old  man,  who  proved  to  be  his 
father,  played  a  prominent  part.     I  will  say,  in  passing,  that  his  neurosis 

*  This  case  was  originally  reported  in  The  Journal  of  Abnormal 
Psychology,  December,  1913.  Cf.  Brill:  Psychanalytic  Fragments 
from  a  Day's  Work. 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  119 

was  directed  entirely  against  his  father.  His  feelings  toward  the 
latter  were  ambivalent;  he  was  abnormally  attached  to  him,  and  at 
the  same  time  he  hated  him  unconsciously.  This  was  especially  en- 
hanced by  his  father's  second  marriage.  He  hated  his  stepmother  with 
all  the  possible  hatred  of  a  stepson,  although  on  the  surface  nothing 
could  be  detected,  if  anything  he  was  believed  to  be  devoted  to  her. 
The  associations  to  the  old  man  of  the  dream  recalled  many  old  men 
he  had  known,  plus  a  mass  of  ideas  connected  with  them.  He  con- 
tinued to  associate  ideas  for  some  time,  and  one  set  of  associations  re- 
peated itself  with  slight  variations  over  and  over  again,  until  it  occurred 
to  me  that  there  must  be  some  reason  for  this  recurrence.  The  asso- 
ciations ran  as  follows:  "Mr.  X.  is  a  fine  old  man.  .  .  .  Mr.  Z.  is  another 
nice  old  gentleman,  whom  I  met  while  I  took  my  trip  around  the  world. 
He  was  very  interested  in  me — he  took  a  sort  of  fatherly  interest  in  me. 
He  is  not  as  old  as  he  looks;  his  long,  gray  beard  gives  him  a  patriarchal 
air;  now  he  reminds  me  of  Father  Time,  who  is  represented  as  an  old, 
patriarchal-looking  man,  holding  a  scythe."  When  I  pressed  him  for 
further  associations  he  thought  of  his  own  father,  to  whom  he  often 
referred  as  "the  old  man,"  and  added:  "My  father  is  not  as  old,  and  has 
no  beard,  though  he  shows  some  resemblance  to  Mr.  Z."  The  mean- 
ing of  the  obsession  suddenly  became  clear  to  me.  "Killing  time" 
meant  kilhng  his  father,  which  was  one  of  his  unconscious  thoughts. 
The  obsession  was  formed  first  by  the  slight  resemblance  between  the 
picture  of  Father  Time  and  his  own  father*  by  substituting  the  idea, 
"Father  Time,"  for  the  visual  picture  and  by  omitting  the  word  father 
(ellipsis).     The  idea  of  kilhng  was  symbolized  by  the  scythe. 

It  is  impossible  for  me  to  describe  the  patient's  reaction  on  hearing 
this  analysis;  I  wish  it  were  possible  to  depict  it  in  some  way.  The 
emotional  reaction  was  marvelous;  for  the  moment  he  was  speechless; 
he  then  cried  and  laughed,  and  exclaimed,  "Now  you've  got  it,  I  can 
feel  it,  you  have  taken  a  ton  off  my  head."  The  obsession  disap- 
peared with  the  analysis. 

However,  whenever  an  intensive  love  is  confronted  by 
just  as  strong  a  hatred  there  always  results  a  partial  paralysis 
of  volition.     It  is  an  inability  to  form  decisions  in  all  those 

*  He  finally  recalled  that  while  living  abroad  a  few  years  ago  his  father 
wore  a  full  beard. 


120  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

actions  for  which  love  forms  the  motive  power.  This 
indecision  does  not  confine  itself  long  to  one  group,  but 
becomes  diffused  over  all  actions  by  the  familiar  mechanism 
of  displacement. 

This  gives  rise  to  the  predominance  of  compulsion  and 
doubt  as  we  find  them  in  the  psychic  life  of  compulsive 
neurotics.  "Doubt  corresponds  to  the  inner  perception  of 
the  indecision,  which  in  consequence  of  the  inhibition  of 
love  through  hatred  usurps  every  intentional  action  of  the 
patient."6  It  is  really  the  doubt  about  love  which  should 
be  the  most  certain  of  all  subjective  feelings,  which  spreads 
to  even-thing  else  and  then  becomes  displaced  to  the 
most  indifferent  trifles.  He  who  doubts  his  love  must 
also  doubt  everything  of  lesser  importance.  A  few 
years  ago  I  was  consulted  by  a  man  of  fifty-six  years 
who  was  obsessed  with  the  idea  that  he  was  not  fit  for 
the  position  he  occupied.  He  stated  that  he  was  not 
sure  of  his  actions,  that  no  matter  what  he  did  he  imagined 
was  wrong,  and  that  he  really  made  many  business 
mistakes.  He  resigned  his  position  as  manager  of  a  big 
business  concern,  but  after  examining  everything  the 
officers  of  the  company  were  satisfied  that  he  made  no 
mistakes  at  all  and  insisted  upon  his  remaining  with  them. 
I  myself  spoke  with  a  member  of  the  firm  who  told  me 
that  during  his  thirty  years  service  there  had  been  no 
complaints  against  him.  The  patient  admitted  that  he 
was  quite  capable  of  filling  his  office  up  to  a  few  months 
before  but  that  since  then  he  had  been  doubting  the 
correctness  of  his  business  transactions.  In  brief  it  was 
a  typical  case  of  doubting  mania. 

The  analysis  revealed  that  the  neurosis  became  manifest 


THE    COMPULSION    NEUROSES  121 

when  he  was  about  to  marry  a  young  woman  who  was 
twenty-two  years  his  junior.  He  at  first  worried  over  the 
fact  that  he  would  not  be  able  to  "make  good"  as  a  husband, 
because  he  believed  himself  to  be  sexually  impotent.  This 
doubt  then  became  generalized  and  displaced  to  all  his 
business  transactions.  Long  before  he  consulted  me  he  no 
longer  thought  of  his  sexual  impotence,  but  occupied  him- 
self constantly  with  absurd  questions  concerning  legitimate 
business  affairs. 

The  same  doubt  which  produces  uncertainty  and  leads 
to  continued  repetition  in  the  protective  measures,  in 
order  to  drive  away  uncertainty,  finally  brings  it  about 
that  these  protective  acts  become  just  as  impossible  of 
accomplishment  as  the  originally  inhibited  decision  of 
love.  Thus  a  patient  recommended  to  me  by  Dr.  Pierce 
Bailey  of  New  York  was  in  the  habit  of  praying  for  an 
hour  and  sometimes  even  longer  before  retiring.  His 
father  stated  that  he  could  not  be  stopped  and  that  he 
usually  fell  asleep  while  praying  on  his  knees.  This 
patient  was  not  very  religious.  He  told  me  that  his 
prayers  were  constantly  interrupted  by  extraneous 
blasphemous  thoughts  which  usually  repeated  the  opposite 
of  what  he  was  praying  for.  Investigation  showed  that 
his  prayers  were  usually  offered  for  those  who  played  the 
leading  part  in  his  neurosis  and  that  the  fancies  obtruding 
themselves  contained  the  opposite  impulse  of  that  which 
the  prayer  was  to  ward  off. 

The  compulsion,  however,  is  an  attempted  compensa- 
tion for  the  doubt  and  a  correction  for  the  unbearable 
state  of  inhibition  as  evidenced  by  the  doubt.  If  any  of 
the  inhibited  resolutions  is  finally  decided  upon,  it  must 


122  PSYCHANALYSIS 

be  brought  to  completion.  To  be  sure  it  is  no  longer  the 
original  one,  but  its  dammed  in  energy  will  not  abandon 
the  opportunity  of  finding  an  outlet  through  the  substitu- 
tive action.  It  therefore  manifests  itself  in  commands 
and  prohibitions  depending  on  whether  the  loved  or  the 
hostile  impulse  occupies  the  path  of  discharge.  If  the 
obsessive  command  cannot  be  brought  to  execution  it 
produces  an  unbearable  tension  which  is  perceived  as 
marked  anxiety. 

These  are  some  of  the  deeper  mechanisms  of  compulsion 
neurosis.  I  realize  that  some  may  find  them  somewhat 
too  complicated  to  follow,  but  the  only  way  of  obviating 
these  difficulties  is  close  study  and  personal  experience. 

References 

1.  Selected  papers  on  Hysteria,  p.  155. 

2.  Cf.  Chap.  XI.  on  The  Only  Child. 

3.  Cf.  Chap.  III. 

4.  Jahrb.  f.  Psychoanal.  u.  Psychopath.  Forschungen,  Vol.  I,  p.  375. 

5.  L.  c,  p.  419. 

6.  L.  c,  p.  416. 


CHAPTER  V 
THE  UNCONSCIOUS  FACTORS  IN  THE  NEUROSES 

One  of  the  rules  that  I  invariably  follow  in  my  psychanalytic 
work  is  not  to  analyze  the  patient's  dreams  until  I  am  fairly 
well  acquainted  with  the  "lay  of  the  land"  of  his  mental 
make-up.  Dream  analyses  require  the  full  cooperation  of 
the  dreamer.  He  must  conceal  absolutely  nothing  that 
enters  into  his  consciousness  during  the  analysis  and  be 
ready  to  answer  all  questions  put  to  him.  It  often  happens 
that  I  hear  dreams  that  could  be  analyzed  without  any 
assistance,  but,  as  a  rule,  it  is  impossible  to  get  at  all  the 
facts  without  the  dreamer's  help.  To  obtain  this  one  must 
have  the  patient's  confidence;  there  must  be  some  rapport 
between  patient  and  doctor,  and  it  usually  takes  a  few 
weeks  before  this  is  established.  Now  and  then,  however, 
one  is  forced  to  make  an  exception,  and  rarely  it  is  even 
necessary  to  utilize  dream  analysis  to  bring  about  this 
rapport.  It  is  of  such  an  experience  that  I  am  about  to 
speak. 

A  very  brilliant  but  rather  skeptical  woman  of  thirty-six 

years — she  was  a  doctor's  daughter — was  referred  to  me  for 

psychanalytic  treatment  because  of  a  very  severe  neurosis 

from  which  she  had  been  suffering  over  fifteen  years.     She 

soon  learned  from  friends  and  acquaintances  that  I  was  a 

dream  interpreter,  and  was  anxiously  waiting  to  find  out 

the  meaning  of  her  dreams.     At  my  request  she  brought  me 

dreams  every  day,  but  I  refused  to  tell  her  their  meaning. 

123 


124  PSYCHANALYSIS 

She  then  sought  information  from  the  literature,  and,  con- 
trary to  my  wishes,  read  my  translation  of  Freud's  selected 
papers  OD  hysteria.  One  morning  she  brought  the  follow- 
ing dream:  "/  was  with  a  crowd  of  people,  and  we  wanted 
to  pick  sonic  flowers,  or  rather  wanted  to  steal  them.  We 
came  to  a  garden  and  I  saw  beautiful  floivers.  I  was  about 
to  steal  some  when  suddenly  I  descried  a  man  looking  out 
of  a  window.  Fearing  that  I  was  detected,  I  asked  him 
whether  I  could  pick  some  flowers.  He  jumped  up  and  cried: 
'Now  I  know  who  has  been  stealing  all  these  flowers.'  I  was 
frightened,  started  to  run  away,  and  awoke." 

When  she  finished  reciting  the  dream  she  teasingly  de- 
manded its  meaning,  and  when  I  reminded  her  that  I  did 
not  analyze  dreams  for  the  first  fewT  weeks,  she  mockingly 
accused  me  of  not  knowing  what  the  dream  meant  and 
harassed  me  with  the  question:  "What  does  it  mean  to  pick 
flowers  in  a  dream?"  until  I  was  forced  to  take  up  the  analysis. 
When  I  asked  her  to  focus  her  attention  on  the  dream  and 
repeat  her  thoughts  she  insisted  that  nothing  came  to  her 
mind.  This  answer,  "Nothing  comes  to  my  mind,"  is  often 
heard  from  beginners  who  are  not  accustomed  to  "continuous 
associations,"  from  people  who  are  impeded  by  conscious  or 
unconscious  resistances,  and,  last  but  not  least,  one  hears 
this  answer  where  the  element  of  the  dream  refers  to  a 
symbolic  expression.  In  the  last  case  the  meaning  is  found 
in  the  symbol  or  double  meaning  expressed  in  the  element  of 
the  dream.  It  did  not  take  me  long  to  decide  that  we  dealt 
here  with  the  last  theory,  and  the  meaning  of  the  dream  soon 
became  clear  to  me.  As  a  prologue  to  the  interpretation  I 
shall  relate  the  following  facts:  As  I  said  above,  I  was  aware 
that  the  patient  had  read  Professor  Freud's  book,  and  when 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS    FACTORS   IN    THE    NEUROSES        125 

she  kept  on  hurling  at  me  the  question  of  flower  picking  in 
the  dream  some  passages  in  the  book  flashed  through  my 
mind.  These  passages  deal  with  the  mechanism  of  the 
therapeutic  effects  of  the  psychoneuroses.  Thus,  we  are 
told  that  the  "psychoneuroses  are  distorted  substitutive 
gratifications  of  impulses,  the  existence  of  which  one  must 
deny  to  himself  and  to  others";  that  "their  capacity  to  exist 
rests  on  the  distortion  and  misjudgment";  and  that  with  the 
solution  of  the  riddle  they  present,  and  with  the  acceptance 
of  the  solution  by  the  patients,  these  morbid  states  become 
incapable  of  existence."1  In  brief,  it  is  asserted  that  the 
morbid  symptom  disappears  as  soon  as  psychanalysis  dis- 
covers its  hidden  meaning  and  brings  it  to  the  surface.  By 
way  of  illustration,  Freud  mentions  the  fact  that  the  visual 
hallucination  of  the  Holy  Virgin  used  to  be  a  frequent 
occurrence  among  peasant  girls,  and  as  long  as  such  a  mani- 
festation drew  a  large  crowd  of  believers,  and  even  resulted 
in  the  erection  of  a  chapel  over  the  holy  shrine,  the  visionary 
state  of  these  girls  remained  inaccessible  to  suggestion. 
To-day  even  the  priesthood  has  changed  its  attitude  toward 
such  manifestations.  They  allow  the  doctor  and  the  police- 
man to  take  charge  of  the  visionary  girl,  and  consequently 
the  Holy  Virgin  seldom  reveals  herself  nowadays.  To  illus- 
trate further,  he  says:  "Let  us  assume  that  a  circle  of  ladies 
and  gentlemen  of  good  breeding  have  agreed  upon  making  a 
day's  excursion  to  some  country  place.  The  ladies  have 
decided  among  themselves  that  if  one  of  them  should  desire 
to  satisfy  a  natural  want  she  was  to  say  aloud  that  she  was 
going  to  pick  some  flowers.  But  a  mischievous  joker  dis- 
covered this  secret  and  put  on  the  printed  programme  sent 
to  those  invited:    'If  the  ladies  wish  to  ease  Nature  they 


126  PSYCHANALYSIS 

should  say  that  they  are  going  to  pick  flowers.'  Of  course, 
none  of  the  ladies  would  then  wish  to  make  use  of  this  covert 
allusion,  and  this  also  made  impossible  the  use  of  a  similar 
formula."  These  quotations  from  Freud's  book  came  to 
my  mind  and,  as  you  can  see,  furnished  the  key  to  the  dream. 
However,  to  verify  my  assumption,  I  ascertained  that  she  had 
finished  reading  the  book  the  evening  before  the  dream.  I 
might  add  that  the  passages  cited  are  from  the  last  two  pages 
of  the  book.  She  saw  no  connection  between  my  questions 
and  her  dream,  but  took  my  "irrelevant  questioning"  as 
further  evidence  of  my  ignorance  of  dream  analysis.  I  was 
inquisitive  to  know  whether  she  would  discover  the  con- 
nection between  the  dream  and  the  story  in  the  book,  but 
despite  all  my  leading  up  to  it  I  was  finally  forced  to  call 
her  attention  to  it.  This  was  followed  by  a  mingled  reac- 
tion of  shame  and  laughter,  lasting  for  a  few  moments,  and 
ending  by  her  remarking,  "And  shall  I  add  that  I  took  a  dose 
of  calomel  before  retiring,  and  was  awakened  by  it." 

Now,  let  us  consider  the  psychologic  principles  that 
gave  rise  to  this  dream.  On  the  day  preceding  the  dream 
I  had  a  long  discussion  with  the  patient  about  certain  sexual 
experiences  of  her  life.  She  refused  to  give  me  any  informa- 
tion beyond  what  her  physician  wrote  to  me.  Although 
married  for  years  and  the  mother  of  a  few  children,  she 
looked  upon  sex  with  the  greatest  disgust.  The  very  word 
was  disagreeable  and  nauseous  to  her.  From  her  physician 
I  learned  that  for  some  time  after  marriage  she  evinced  an 
abhorrence  to  any  intimate  relations  with  her  husband. 
Later  she  became  more  tolerant,  but  always  became  hys- 
terical over  it,  and  always  expressed  her  disgust  for  it.  In 
brief,  she  was  a  marked  natura  frigida,  and  evinced  a  typical 


THE   UNCONSCIOUS    FACTORS    IN    THE    NEUROSES        127 

infantile  sexuality.  She  had  an  enormous  craving  for 
affection,  she  loved  to  be  fondled  and  petted  by  her  husband, 
and  stated  that  she  would  be  perfectly  happy  in  her  married 
life  if  only  sex  would  not  come  in.  When  I  tried  to  have  her 
go  into  details  about  a  definite  phase  of  her  history  she  re- 
fused to  do  so  because  it  touched  upon  sex.  She  made  a 
great  many  efforts,  but  I  saw  that  she  really  could  not  con- 
tinue. I  anticipated  some  of  her  thoughts  and  told  them  to 
her.  She  was  very  much  impressed,  and  remarked:  "Why 
don't  you  tell  me  everything  if  you  know  it?  I  wish  you 
would  talk  instead  of  asking  me  questions."  I  retorted 
that  it  was  necessary  that  she  should  do  the  talking  herself. 
She  agreed  to  do  so  the  next  day,  as  our  session  was  then  at 
an  end.  It  was  shortly  after  she  left  me  that  she  read  the 
part  of  the  book  which  I  have  cited. 

What  were  the  psychologic  mechanisms  that  entered 
into  the  formation  of  this  dream?  When  the  patient  left 
me  she  debated  with  herself  whether  or  not  to  reveal  to  me 
what  she  called  the  disagreeable  part  of  herself.  She  re- 
flected over  some  of  the  thoughts  that  she  would  have  to 
disclose  and  could  not  make  up  her  mind  to  tell  them. 
This  struggle  continued  throughout  the  day,  but  now  and 
then  it  was  crowded  out  from  consciousness  by  other 
thoughts.  On  falling  asleep  this  stream  of  thought,  endowed 
with  so  much  interest,  though  dulled  by  the  desire  to  sleep, 
nevertheless  retained  some  of  its  activity.  Experience  in 
dream  analysis  teaches  that  in  order  to  form  a  dream  the 
stream  of  thought  in  question  must  succeed  in  arousing 
and  in  forming  a  connection  with  one  of  the  unconscious 
repressed  tendencies  from  childhood.  It  is  through  this 
reinforced  energy  that  this  stream  of  thought,  or  day  rem- 


1 JS  PSYCHANALYSIS 

nant,  attains  sufficient  force  to  reach  consciousness  in  the 
form  of  a  dream.  The  patient's  dream  was  the  expression 
of  the  wish  to  disclose  to  me  that  part  of  herself  which  was 
under  very  strong  repression  and  suppression.  The  deter- 
minant of  the  dream  was  the  conflict  of  the  previous  day 
about  her  hidden  sexuality,  which  continued  its  activity 
during  sleep  and  aroused  any  number  of  associations  from 
early  life.  Once  the  connection  was  formed,  the  thoughts 
obtruded  themselves  upon  consciousness,  as  in  the  dream; 
but  the  vigilance  of  the  psychic  censor  is  plainly  visible: 
The  story  she  had  read  the  day  before  impressed  her  very 
much  because  it  showed  the  futility  and  ridiculousness 
of  prudishness,  and  because  it  expressed  the  identical  ideas 
that  entered  into  our  discussion.  The  dream,  therefore, 
makes  use  of  the  beautiful  formula,  "to  pick  flowers,"  in  order 
to  hide  a  contrasting  idea  to  ease  Nature.  As  I  said  before, 
our  patient  was  altogether  infantile  in  her  sexuality.  She 
knew  absolutely  nothing  of  adult  sexuality  wdien  she  married. 
She  made  no  distinction  between  the  vagina  and  anus 
(Freud's  cloaca  theory) ;  both  were  equally  tabooed,  hence 
to  ease  Nature  w7as  equivalent  to  a  sexual  act.  The  allusion 
in  the  dream  to  something  immoral  and  forbidden  is  nicely 
expressed  by  the  fact  that  she  was  not  merely  going  to  pick 
flowers,  but  to  steal  them.  The  man  in  the  dream  was  my- 
self; I  discovered  her  sexuality,  and  it  wras  from  me  that 
she  wras  trying  to  run  away.  At  the  same  time  this  ex- 
presses the  wish  to  be  detected  and  seen,  which  goes  back 
to  the  wish  expressed  the  day  before  that  I  should  tell  her  all 
there  was  to  be  known  of  sex,  and  not  ask  her  any  questions, 
and  to  a  marked  childhood  exhibitionism  and  immorality 
which  later  gave  the  reaction  of  extreme  bashful  ncss  and 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS    FACTORS    IN    THE    NEUROSES        129 

prudery.  I  might  add  that  this  dream  nicely  illustrates  the 
part  played  by  an  organic  stimulus.  When  the  patient  first 
told  me  the  dream,  she  purposely  omitted  that  she  was 
awakened  by  the  griping  of  the  calomel  and  had  to  empty 
her  bowels.  It  was  only  after  I  called  her  attention  to  the 
meaning  of  flower  picking  that  she  corroborated  my  inter- 
pretation by  telling  me  the  part  played  by  the  dose  of 
calomel.  As  can  be  seen,  there  was  an  effort  to  render 
harmless  the  stimulus,  the  griping,  as  a  sleep  disturber. 
This  is  always  the  case  in  all  the  so-called  convenience 
or  laziness  dreams,2  where  the  sensory  stimuli  are  taken 
up  by  the  dream  and  woven  into  a  wish.  As  a  rule,  however, 
such  dreams  are  undisguised.  Here  the  disguise  was  essen- 
tial and  followed  the  tendencies  of  the  patient's  mental 
make-up.  The  consciousness  of  the  real  meaning  of  the 
dream  would  have  been  very  disagreeable,  and  throughout 
her  whole  life  she  was  accustomed  to  invest  everything  with 
a  poetic  atmosphere. 

Bearing  in  mind  the  dream  and  its  interpretation,  it  may 
be  said  that  the  different  stages  of  the  whole  process  were 
the  following:  (1)  A  mental  stream  produced  during  the 
day;  (2)  a  subsequent  forgetfulness  of  the  same;  and  (3)  its 
reappearance  in  consciousness  in  a  disguised  form  in  the 
dream.  The  last  stage — the  dream — is  totally  foreign  or,  we 
may  say,  unconscious  to  the  patient.  In  other  words,  the 
original  thoughts  or  impressions  underwent  a  certain  change 
before  they  reappeared  in  the  dream,  and  the  only  way  to 
find  their  meaning  was  by  comparing  them  with  the  latent 
thoughts.  The  latter,  though  unconscious  to  the  patient, 
were,  nevertheless,  the  active  elements  of  the  dream.  This 
mechanism    shows    the  striking   analogy  to  the  so-called 


130  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

"posthypnotic  suggestions."  As  we  know,  Bernheim  and 
Others  <!<>  this  experiment  in  the  following  manner:  A  person 
is  hypnotized,  and  while  in  this  state  ordered  by  the  doctor 
to  perform  a  certain  task  at  the  expiration  of  a  certain  time 
after  awakening.  He  is  then  awakened  and  is  in  normal 
condition;  he  has  no  recollection  of  his  hypnotic  state,  and 
yet  at  the  appointed  time  he  is  seized  with  an  impulse  to  per- 
form the  task  assigned  to  him  and  he  does  it  consciously  and 
rationally  without  knowing  why.  When  questioned  about 
it  he  usually  finds  some  excuse  for  his  action.  Here  it  must 
be  said  that  the  order  had  been  present  in  the  mind  of  the 
person  in  a  latent  or  unconscious  state  until  the  designated 
time,  and  then  suddenly  merged  to  consciousness.  In 
normal  life  this  is  noticed  in  such  actions  as  mailing  letters, 
etc.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  not  everything  comes  to  the 
surface.  Thus  the  command,  the  influence  of  the  doctor, 
the  recollection  of  the  hypnotic  state  remain  unconscious — 
all  that  is  remembered  is  the  idea  of  the  act  to  be  performed. 
Moreover,  the  idea  of  the  action  ordered  in  the  hypnotic 
state  not  only  becomes  conscious  at  a  given  time,  but  it  also 
becomes  active  as  soon  as  it  reaches  consciousness.  But 
as  the  real  stimulus  to  the  action  was  the  order  of  the  physi- 
cian, it  must  be  conceded  that  the  idea  of  the  physician's 
order  became  active,  too;  but  as  it  remains  unconscious 
we  are  justified  in  saying  that  it  was  active  and  unconscious 
at  the  same  time.3 

The  fact  of  posthypnotic  suggestions  finds  full  corrobora- 
tion in  the  works  of  Pierre  Janet,  Breuer  and  Freud,  Morton 
Prince,  and  others.  All  these  investigators  found  that 
hysterical  patients  evince  many  active  yet  unconscious 
mechanisms.     This   has   been   especially   demonstrated   by 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS    FACTORS    IN    THE    NEUROSES        131 

Freud  and  his  school.  In  our  psychanalytic  work  we  always 
find  that  the  psychoneurotic  symptoms  are  governed  by 
motives  of  which  the  patient  is  entirely  unconscious.  Thus, 
I  have  reported  two  patients  who  went  through  major  and 
minor  hysterical  attacks,  lasting  from  a  few  hours  to  days, 
which  on  analysis  proved  to  be  unconscious  reactions  to 
former  erotic  experiences  and  episodes.4  Such  patients 
prove  with  complete  certainty  the  existence  of  an  uncon- 
scious activity,  which  is  made  up  of  infantile  erotic  wish 
feelings  which  experienced  repression  during  the  develop- 
mental period  of  childhood.  In  all  cases  fully  analyzed  one 
finds  an  infantile  stage  evincing  a  polymorphous  perverse 
sexuality,  a  repression  or  emotional  transformation  during 
the  developmental  period  of  childhood — a  return  and  a  re- 
vival of  the  latter,  either  as  a  consequence  of  the  sexual  con- 
stitution or  in  consequence  of  unfavorable  influences  of  the 
sexual  life.  To  illustrate  such  unconscious  activity  I  will 
cite  the  following  case: 

J.  L.,  thirty-three  years  old,  single,  drug  salesman,  was  referred  to 
me  for  treatment  by  Dr.  Beverly  R.  Tucker,  in  the  beginning  of  April, 
1911.  The  patient  had  been  an  active  sufferer  since  1904,  the  main 
symptom  being  a  mysophobia.  A  letter  written  by  Doctor  Tucker 
reads:  "About  five  years  ago  he  got  into  the  habit  of  washing  his  hands 
very  frequently.  This  dirt  phobia  has  expanded  until  now  he  is  afraid 
to  touch  almost  anything  for  fear  of  transmitting  poison  or  filth  in 
an  infinitesimal  amount  to  himself  or  some  other  person."  The  patient 
was  almost  entirely  incapacitated  by  his  neurosis.  He  could  do  noth- 
ing without  getting  into  trouble.  He  was  afraid  to  touch  anything 
that  had  any  dust  on  it.  If  he  noticed  spots  on  his  clothes  he  imme- 
diately washed  his  hands  over  and  over  again  because  he  imagined  that 
he  had  touched  them.  He  would  get  into  a  state  of  excitement  over  it, 
which  manifested  itself  in  anxiety  and  perspiration.  His  hands  were 
almost  always  wet  with  perspiration.  He  was  especially  worried  by 
poisons,  and,  having  been  a  drug  salesman,  he  saw  poison  in  every- 


l'S'2  PSYCHANALYSIS 

thing.  Thus,  he  did  not  use  a  match  for  years  because  matches  contain 
phosphorus  or  sulphur.  When  he  wanted  to  light  a  cigar  he  always 
managed  to  do  it  in  some  other  way.  Usually  he  went  into  cigar  stores, 
where  one  can  always  find  a  cigar  lighter.  When  a  box  of  matches  was 
left  in  his  room  he  became  very  much  excited  over  it,  asked  the  maid  to 
remove  it,  and  had  the  spot  scrubbed  and  cleaned.  On  the  other 
hand,  he  carried  in  his  pocket  a  silver  match-box  containing  matches 
which  he  never  used,  and  which  was  a  constant  source  for  new  phobias. 
His  phobia  for  odors  was  just  as  marked.  When  he  first  came  to  New 
York  he  lived  in  a  hotel,  and  on  entering  his  room  one  afternoon  he  per- 
ceived a  peculiar  odor.  He  inquired  about  it,  and  was  told  that  the 
floors  were  cleaned  with  some  preparation  containing  carbolic  acid. 
This  caused  him  to  leave  the  hotel;  he  was  in  fear  lest  his  coat  might 
have  touched  the  floor,  taken  up  some  of  the  poison,  and  transmitted 
it  to  others.  He  was  afraid  to  pass  certain  sides  of  the  street  because  he 
noticed  a  paint  shop  there;  paint  suggested  lead,  which  he  knew  was  a 
poison.  He  would  not  touch  any  metallic  door-knob  because  it  might 
contain  some  "canker"  which  he  thought  was  especially  poisonous — 
by  canker  he  meant  the  greenish  substance  one  often  finds  on  exposed 
metals.  It  was  for  this  reason,  too,  that  he  found  it  hard  to  drink  water 
coming  from  the  hydrant.  These  are  only  a  few  of  the  main  phobias 
which  constantly  obsessed  the  patient.  Here  I  simply  wish  to  point 
out  the  various  stages  in  the  development  of  this  mysophobia,  tracing 
it  throughout  the  patient's  life. 

It  was  during  the  analysis  of  psychoneurotics  that  Freud's 
attention  was  first  called  to  dreams,  the  psychology  of  which 
he  has  later  studied  and  developed.  At  present,  however,  it 
may  be  asserted  that  psychanalysis  is  founded  upon  the 
analysis  of  dreams,  as  dream  analysis  is  the  most  finished  part 
of  psychoanalytic  investigation.  It  was  for  this  reason  that 
I  began  with  the  analysis  of  a  dream  when  I  wished  to  demon- 
strate the  unconscious  elements  in  the  neuroses.  Like  the 
dream,  these  phobias  seem  absurd  and  strange  to  the  patient 
and  the  outsider;  yet,  as  in  the  dream,  the  enigmatic  ab- 
surdities and  the  exaggerated  emotions  disappear  as  soon  as 
the  analysis  is  completed. 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS    FACTORS    IN    THE    NEUROSES        133 

Starting,  therefore,  with  the  formula  that  "the  neurosis  is,  so  to  speak, 
the  negative  of  the  perversion,"4  I  investigated  the  patient's  infantile 
life.  I  shall  mention  here  only  those  elements  that  are  absolutely 
essential  to  explain  the  phobia.  I  found  that  the  patient's  childhood 
was  characterized  by  the  usual  polymorphous  perverse  sexuahty,  but 
that  instead  of  undergoing  the  usual  repression  it  continued  throughout 
the  whole  latency  period.  From  his  early  childhood  he  displayed  a  very 
strong  aggressive  activity  in  his  sexual  life.  As  far  as  he  could  recall 
he  indulged  in  sexual  looking,  despite  frequent  punishment.  He  dis- 
played a  strong  desire  for  coprophilic  activities.  He  took  an  unusual 
interest  in  feces  and  urine,  he  liked  the  odor  of  water-closets,  and  one 
of  his  favorite  indulgences  was  to  put  his  finger  between  his  sweating 
toes  and  then  smell  them.  He  was  often  punished  for  these  acts  by 
both  parents,  and  especially  his  father.  He  began  to  masturbate  long 
before  the  age  of  puberty,  and  his  first  love  affair  began  between  ten 
and  eleven.  In  brief,  there  was  no  latency  period  to  speak  of — all  the 
infantile  activities  were  continued  to  adult  life,  with  only  little  con- 
flict. From  fourteen  to  fifteen  he  began  to  be  troubled  with  all  sorts  of 
religious  and  moral  conflicts,  and  he  also  became  very  neat  in  his  ap- 
pearance. He  led  what  he  called  a  pure  life  in  every  way  until  the 
age  of  nineteen,  when  he  consorted  with  a  prostitute.  This  was  fol- 
lowed by  many  reproaches,  so  that  he  had  very  few  such  experiences 
thereafter.  His  neurosis  really  began  at  the  age  of  twenty-one,  when 
he  was  very  scrupulous,  very  moral,  and  very  conscientious.  I  may 
add  that  throughout  his  whole  life  he  evinced  a  very  strong  attach- 
ment for  his  mother.  Whatever  he  did  was  for  his  mother;  he  was 
guided  entirely  by  her  wishes.  For  his  father,  who  died  when  he  was 
about  fourteen,  he  entertained  absolutely  no  regard;  on  the  contrary, 
he  talked  about  him  in  a  contemptuous  manner. 

To  translate  what  has  been  found  into  psychanalytic  language,  we 
may  say  that  so  far  we  have  an  individual  of  normal  make-up  whose 
early  sexual  activities  were  accentuated  to  an  extent  that  there  was 
hardly  any  latency  period  such  as  one  finds  normally.  This  was  fol- 
lowed by  a  correspondingly  strong  suppression  and  repression  in  adult 
life,  and  resulted  in  a  more  or  less  inhibited  life,  owing  to  his  incapacity 
to  sublimate  properly.  This  maladjustment  was  shown  in  a  great  many 
ways.  When  his  father  died  he  left  a  wholesale  and  retail  drug-store, 
the  management  of  which  he  later  undertook.  He  always  disliked  the 
drug  business,  and  had  it  not  been  for  his  duty  to  his  mother  he  would 


134  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

have  taken  up  something  else.  His  mother  was  aware  of  his  feelings, 
ami  urged  him  to  adopt  some  other  occupation.  He  made  many  at- 
tempts, and  obtained  good  positions  in  which  he  "made  good,"  but  al- 
ways bad  to  return  home  and  resume  his  old  work.  "I  felt  that  I 
owed  it  to  my  mother;  it  was  my  love  for  her  that  made  me  give  up 
everything  else,"  he  said  when  discussing  this.  His  love  and  regard 
for  his  mother  was  enhanced  by  the  fact  that  she  was  ailing  much  of 
the  time,  and  because  she  had  a  great  deal  of  trouble  with  the  other 
club  hen.  Thus,  his  older  brother,  to  whom  he  had  looked  up  when 
young,  turned  out  to  be  the  black  sheep  of  the  family.  He  was  a 
drunkard,  and  guilty  of  theft,  bigamy  and  desertion  from  the  army. 
To  add  more  mortification  for  his  mother  two  of  his  sisters  eloped,  so 
that  he,  always  having  been  his  mother's  favorite,  was  her  only  consola- 
tion. She  continually  urged  him  not  to  be  like  his  brother.  He  prom- 
ised her  everything  and  tried  to  live  up  to  his  promises.  He  got  along 
fairly  well  until  the  following  episode  took  place:  In  1899  he  made 
the  acquaintance  of  a  woman  who  tempted  him,  and  in  a  moment  of 
passion  he  once  touched  her  vulva.  He  was  immediately  seized  with 
remorse  and  fear.  He  thought  that  he  had  committed  a  terrible 
crime  against  his  mother.  He  had  the  impulse  to  go  and  explain  every- 
thing to  her  and  ask  her  forgiveness,  but  could  not  make  up  his  mind  to 
do  it.  Whenever  he  was  ready  to  make  the  confession  he  thought  of 
the  great  worry  that  it  would  cause  her,  and  so  refrained  from  doing  it. 
For  a  period  of  about  five  years  he  apparently  suffered  from  a  mild 
mixed  neurosis.  He  was  obsessed  by  the  idea  that  he  might  be  shot  by 
this  woman's  father  or  brother  for  having  insulted  her,  and  showed 
many  other  neurotic  symptoms.  His  mother's  condition  grew  worse, 
as  she  had  cancer  of  the  liver,  and  he  was  with  her  a  great  deal.  During 
the  last  days  of  her  life  she  often  admonished  him  to  lead  a  clean,  up- 
right life.  It  was  shortly  before  she  died,  in  1904,  that  he  began  to  show 
the  hand-washing  mania  which  expanded  later  into  the  other  phobias. 
What  happened  may  be  described  as  follows:  The  sexual  libido,  active 
during  childhood  and  adult  life,  was  suddenly  repressed.  Now  and  then 
there  was  an  attempt  at  readjustment  of  his  libido  through  some  erotic 
experience  in  the  form  of  a  love  affair  or  gross  sexual  experience.  Occa- 
sionally, he  would  go  out  with  his  friends  and  drink  and  carouse.  Such 
experiences  were  always  followed  by  terrible  reproaches,  as  they  were 
incompatible  with  his  religious  and  ethical  training  inculcated  by  his 
mother.     Continuing  in  the  drug  business  despite  his  dislike  for  it,  he 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS    FACTORS    IN    THE    NEUROSES        135 

was  unable  to  sublimate  his  sex  energy  on  something  higher.  All  his 
libido  was,  therefore,  centered  on  his  mother;  she  was  his  ideal  in  every 
respect,  the  only  person  he  could  love.  All  his  attempted  love  affairs 
turned  out  failures.  The  high  tide  of  libido  which  became  detached 
with  his  mother's  death,  therefore,  caused  a  regressive  revival  of  his 
auto-erotic  sexuality.6  He  could  find  no  outlet  elsewhere,  hence  he  had 
to  resort  to  himself.  But  as  his  auto-erotic  sexuality  dealt  with  copro- 
philic  activities,  which  were  entirely  incompatible  with  his  present  ego, 
they  had  to  manifest  themselves  in  a  negative  form.  Had  they  re- 
turned in  their  original  form  he  would  have  suffered  from  perversions. 
The  motive  power  of  the  phobia  was,  therefore,  the  repressed  libido, 
while  the  determinants  were  furnished  by  actual  occurrences  at  the  time 
of  the  onset.  Thus,  the  hand-washing  signified  a  moral  stain,  and  was 
determined  by  the  touching  of  the  vulva.  The  usual  generalization 
then  took  place,  and  the  patient  feared  all  stains,  and,  by  a  form  of 
rationalization  (as  fitly  expressed  by  Doctor  Jones),  he  thought  that  he 
feared  the  stains  because  they  represented  drugs  and  poisons.  The 
phobia  for  "canker"  appeared  after  his  mother  died,  and  was  simply  a 
sound  association  of  cancer.  The  immediate  onset  of  the  symptoms  was 
probably  helped  by  the  fact  that  for  days  before  she  died  his  mother's 
stools  were  very  offensive. 

The  morbid  gain  of  the  disease  was  twofold:  First,  it  served  as  a 
sexual  gratification  and  represented  some  components  of  his  sexual  life;7 
second,  it  took  him  away  from  the  occupation  he  disliked. 

These  analyses  serve  to  show  the  part  played  by  the  unconscious 
activity  in  the  neuroses;  they  amply  demonstrate  the  futility  of  the  old 
Anschauungen  in  the  examination  and  treatment  of  the  psychoneuroses. 
This  patient  was  treated  for  years  by  the  orthodox  methods.  He 
received  his  share  of  medicines  and  rest-cures  at  home  and  in  sana- 
toriums  without  the  slightest  improvement.  He  was  with  me  about 
five  months  when  I  discharged  him  as  cured.  I  had  the  pleasure  of 
seeing  Doctor  Tucker  during  his  recent  visit  to  New  York,  and  I  was 
gratified  to  hear  that  the  patient  was  perfectly  well.  Last  January 
the  patient  himself  paid  me  a  social  visit  while  here  on  business.  I 
found  him  to  be  in  perfect  health,  showing  absolutely  no  trace  of  his 
former  trouble.  While  talking  to  me  he  remarked  that  he  was  no  longer 
in  the  drug  business,  and  for  the  moment  I  was  somewhat  shocked ;  but 
he  anticipated  my  thoughts  and  laughingly  said:  "No,  it  was  not  on 
account  of  phobias  that  I  gave  it  up;  I  did  not  dare  give  it  up  while  I 


136  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

was  sick,  but  since  getting  well  I  thought  I  could  do  much  better  in  some 
other  business,  and  1  finally  found  something  that  i9  much  more  lucra- 
tive than  selling  drugs."  I  was  both  surprised  and  interested  to  hear 
that  he  was  selling  perfumes — a  compromise  formation  serving  a  useful 
purpose  which  throws  some  light  on  the  psychology  of  trade  selection.8 

Now,  I  have  been  asked  repeatedly  how  psychanalysis 
cures.  The  last  questioner  argued:  "Suppose  I  grant  you 
that  this  means  that  and  that  that  means  this,  how  is  the 
patient  cured?"  To  answer  this  question  I  related  a  story 
which  I  shall  here  repeat.  A  German  professor  of  astronomy 
invited  his  colleagues  to  take  luncheon  with  him.  After 
the  cigars  were  served  he  asked  them  to  accompany  him  to 
his  garden,  of  which  he  was  very  proud.  In  European  gar- 
dens one  often  sees  hollow  iridescent  glass  globes  placed  on 
sticks  between  the  bushes.  While  walking,  one  of  the 
guests,  a  professor  of  physics,  happened  to  touch  one  of  these 
globes  and  was  surprised  to  rind  it  very  hot.  What  puzzled 
him  was  the  fact  that  the  heat  was  not  on  the  side  heated 
by  the  sun,  but  on  the  opposite  side.  On  touching  the  other 
side  he  found  it  comparatively  cool.  He  called  his  col- 
league's attention  to  this  phenomenon  and  asked  them  to 
explain  it.  The  discussion  that  followed  first  became 
very  animated,  and  then  even  personal.  As  soon  as  one 
offered  a  theory  it  was  disproved  by  the  others.  Not  one 
of  these  learned  men  could  explain  this  phenomenon.  While 
they  were  thus  quarrelling  the  gardener  approached  unob- 
served, and,  upon  discovering  the  dispute,  turned  to  the 
host,  and  said:  "Professor,  just  before  you  came  here  with 
the  gentlemen  I  turned  the  globe  around.  I  do  this  every 
day  at  this  time." 

Of  course,  the  arguments  and  quarrels  ceased  in  a  trice; 


THE    UNCONSCIOUS    FACTORS    IN   THE    NEUROSES        137 

there  was  nothing  left  to  dispute  about.  Had  the  gardener 
not  made  his  appearance,  would  these  learned  men  have 
ever  settled  the  problem?  Surely  not.  The  energy  that 
they  were  trying  so  hard  to  explain  away  did  not  belong 
there — it  was  displaced.  We  may  say  the  same  of  the 
phobias  and  obsessions,  the  exaggerated  affect  is  justified  in 
its  right  place,  but  it  does  not  belong  to  the  symptom.  The 
gardener  has  turned  the  globe  around 

References 

1.  Selected  Papers  on  Hysteria,  2d  ed.,  p.  213. 

2.  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams,  p.  104. 

3.  Freud:  A  Note  on  the  Unconscious  in  Psychanalysis ;  The  Society 
for  Psychic  Research,  Part  LXIV,  Vol.    XXIV. 

4.  Cf.  pp.  246-251. 

5.  Freud:  Three  Contributions  to  the  Sexual  Theory,  p.  38. 

6.  Cf.  pp.  194  and  206. 

7.  Freud:  Selected  Papers,  p.  198. 

8.  Cf.  p.  231. 


CHAPTER  VI 
PSYCHANALYSIS  AND  THE  PSYCHOSES 

The  Work  of  the  Zurich  School — the  Association  Experi- 
ment— Complex  Theory — Mechanism  of 
Delusions  and  Hallucinations 

The  conclusions  reached  by  Freud  as  expressed  in  the 
theories  of  the  psychoneuroses,  dreams  and  the  psycho- 
pathology  of  everyday  life  were  fully  confirmed  by  the 
Zurich  school  after  a  thorough  investigation  on  the  basis 
of  experimental  psychology.  Stimulated  by  Bleuler, 
Jung  and  Riklin1  collected  a  large  number  of  associations 
from  normal  persons  with  the  intention  of  finding  out,  first, 
whether  there  existed  any  regularity  in  the  reactions  and, 
second,  whether  there  were  definite  reaction  types.  They 
soon  discovered  that  the  process  of  association  is  a  very 
flighty  and  variable  psychic  process  and  that  it  is  beyond 
the  limits  of  objective  control.  They  also  found  that 
attention  plays  the  greatest  part  in  the  process  of  associa- 
tion. Although  it  directs  and  modifies  the  associative 
process  it  can  nevertheless  be  most  readily  controlled 
experimentally.  They  therefore  decided  to  investigate 
experimentally  the  following  questions:  1.  The  laws  of 
fluctuation  in  associations  in  the  normal,  and  2.  the  direct 
effects  of  attention  on  the  process  of  association,  especially 
wln'ther  the  validity  of  association  diminishes   relatively 

with  the  distance  from  the  fixation  point  of  consciousness. 

138 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  139 

They  examined  many  educated  and  uneducated  persons 
by  giving  them  a  hundred  stimulus  words  and  noting  the 
reactions.  The  reaction  time  was  measured  with  a  one- 
fifth  second  stop  watch.  The  second  series  of  experiments 
consisted  of  100  associations  with  internal  distraction. 
The  third  series  consisted  of  100  associations  taken  during 
external  distraction  by  means  of  a  metronome.  The 
results  obtained  from  12,400  associations  showed  many 
interesting  facts  of  which  only  few  will  interest  us  here. 

After  classifying  the  associations  it  was  found  that  there 
was  a  distinct  fluctuation  in  the  numerical  relations  of 
single  individuals.  The  main  reason  for  this  was  the 
intensity  of  attention.  That  accounted  for  the  fact  that 
some  reacted  with  inner  and  others  with  outer  associa- 
tions. It  was  found,  for  example,  that  although  every 
person  had  manifold  qualities  of  associations  at  his  dis- 
posal, the  reactions  elicited  nevertheless  depended  on  the 
degree  of  attention  evoked  by  the  stimulus  words.  Thus, 
whenever  the  test  person  was  distracted  he  always  reacted 
with  outer  and  sound  association  rather  than  with  inner 
associations,  i.e.,  he  followed  the  lines  of  least  resistance 
and  reacted  with  habitual  and  easy  speech  combinations. 
Jung  concluded  that  whenever  there  is  a  disturbance  of 
attention  one  must  expect  shallow  reaction  types  or  sound 
associations  and,  conversely,  whenever  one  finds  sound 
associations  one  must  presuppose  a  disturbance  of  attention. 

Without  entering  into  the  theoretical  part  of  associa- 
tions in  general,  I  will  now  show  the  practical  side  of  the 
work  as  it  is  applied  in  the  Clinic  of  Psychiatry  at  Zurich. 

One  hundred  words  are  usually  employed  for  analytic 
and    diagnostic   purposes.      They   are   designated    as   test 


140 


PSYCHANALYSIS 


words  and  were  selected  and  arranged  in  a  manner  to 
strike  almost  all  of  the  common  complexes.  The  test 
words  are  printed  in  rows  with  enough  side  space  for  the 
test  person's  answers  or  reactions.  The  experiment  is 
carried  out  with  the  test  person  sitting  in  front  of  the 
physician  who  calls  out  each  word  in  a  loud  and  clear 
voice,  measuring  at  the  same  time  with  a  one-fifth  of  a 
second  stop  watch  the  time  elapsing  between  the  utterance 
of  the  test  word  and  the  reaction  or  the  answer  from  the 
test  person.  The  average  reaction  time  is  generally  taken 
as  2.4  seconds.  Before  the  experiment  is  begun  the  test 
person  is  instructed  to  pay  attention  to  the  test  words  and 
answer  as  quickly  as  possible  the  first  word  that  comes  to 
his  mind.  The  answers,  as  well  as  the  reaction  time, 
are  carefully  noted  and  after  the  whole  list  has  been  gone 
through,  the  stimulus  words  are  repeated  and  the  patient 
is  asked  to  reproduce  the  original  answers  which  are  again 
noted.  Depending  on  the  case  in  question  some  special 
words  may  be  inserted,  but  as  a  rule  the  following  100 
words  are  used: 


1.  head 

14. 

stem 

27. 

lamp 

2.  green 

15. 

to  dance 

28. 

to  sin 

3.  water 

16. 

village 

29. 

bread 

4.  to  sing 

17. 

lake 

30. 

rich 

5.  dead 

18. 

sick 

31. 

tree 

6.  long 

19. 

pride 

32. 

to  prick 

7.  ship 

20. 

table 

33. 

pity 

8.  to  pay 

21. 

ink 

34. 

yellow 

9.  window 

22. 

angry 

35. 

mountain 

10.  friendly 

23. 

needle 

36. 

to  die 

11.  to  cook 

24. 

to  swim 

37. 

salt 

12.  to  ask 

25. 

voyage 

38. 

new 

13.  cold 

26. 

blue 

39. 

custom 

PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES 


141 


40.  to  pray 

41.  money 

42.  foolish 

43.  pamphlet 

44.  despise 

45.  finger 

46.  expensive 

47.  bird 

48.  to  fall 

49.  book 

50.  unjust 

51.  frog 

52.  to  part 

53.  hunger 

54.  white 

55.  child 

56.  to  take  care 

57.  lead  pencil 

58.  sad 

59.  plum 

60.  to  marry 


61.  house 

62.  dear 

63.  glass 

64.  to  quarrel 

65.  fur 

66.  big 

67.  carrot 

68.  to  paint 

69.  part 

70.  old 

71.  flower 

72.  to  beat 

73.  box 

74.  wild 

75.  family 

76.  to  wash 

77.  cow 

78.  friend 

79.  luck 

80.  lie 

81.  deportment 


82.  narrow 

83.  brother 

84.  to  fear 

85.  stork 

86.  false 

87.  anxiety 

88.  to  kiss 

89.  bride 

90.  pure 

91.  door 

92.  to  choose 

93.  hay 

94.  contented 

95.  ridicule 

96.  to  sleep 

97.  month 

98.  nice 

99.  woman 
100.  to  abuse 


Now  it  would  seem  that  any  intelligent  person  could 
give  a  fluent  answer  to  any  of  these  words  but  one  soon 
becomes  convinced  that  such  is  not  the  case.  As  one 
proceeds  with  the  experiment  he  finds  that  not  all  stimulus 
words  are  reacted  to  with  the  same  smoothness  and 
facility.  In  his  "Association  method"2  Jung  shows  that 
all  apparently  adventitious  mistakes  in  the  association 
experiment  have  a  definite  reason  and  that  contrary  to 
the  belief  of  the  test  person  his  answers  are  not  at  all 
arbitrary,  but  generally  betray  his  inmost  secrets.  Hence 
whenever  we  find  any  impediments  in  the  experiment  such 
as  a  prolonged  reaction  time,  a  lack  of  or  a  faulty  reaction, 
a  repetition  of  the  stimulus  words  or  a  failure  of  repro- 
duction we  have  a  complex  indicator.    That  is,  the  mis- 


1  1-'  PSTCHANALTSIS 

take  indicates  thai  the  stimulus  word  has  touched  a  com- 
plex* and  t  hus retarded orcompletcly inhibited  thereaction. 
The  value  of  this  experiment  is  quite  obvious.  Whereas 
the  patient  may  refuse  to  enter  into  conversation  about 
his  morbid  productions  he  is  quite  willing  to  cooperate  in 
the  experiment.  He  sees  no  harm  in  answering  the  first 
word  evoked  by  the  stimulus  as  he  is  entirely  unaware  of 
its  import.  Some  think  it  is  a  "sort  of  game"  which  has 
no  bearing  on  their  condition.  But  as  soon  as  a  few  com- 
plexes are  found  and  the  association  correctly  interpreted 
the  patient  readily  recognizes  the  superiority  of  the 
examiner  and  generally  talks  freely.  As  I  will  show 
later  this  is  not  as  simple  as  it  may  seem.  To  illustrate 
the  actual  work  I  will  cite  the  following  cases: 

Case  I. — I.  S.,  set.  thirty-nine,  single,  bank  official,  was  transferred 
to  the  psychiatric  clinic  of  Zurich,  November  16,  1907,  from  the 
Bohemian  asylum  of  D.  where  he  had  been  for  about  four  months. 
From  the  abstract  we  learned  that  the  patient  went  through  an  acute 
attack  lasting  only  a  few  weeks.  He  was  markedly  confused  and 
hallucinatory,  but  gradually  improved.  He  had  not,  however, 
regained  any  insight  into  his  condition  and  still  entertained  numerous 
false  ideas. 

On  admission  he  was  orderly  and  well  behaved.  He  seemed  to  take 
a  lively  interest  in  things,  but  was  inclined  to  be  seclusiveand  uncom- 
municative. When  drawn  into  conversation  he  gave  a  fair  account 
of  his  experiences,  but  now  and  then  he  only  vaguely  intimated  things 
absolutely  refusing  to  enter  into  details.  His  orientation  was  perfect, 
no  hallucinations  of  any  kind  could  be  elicited,  though  he  showed  no 
insight  into  his  condition.  Physically,  besides  diminished  knee-jerks, 
nothing  abnormal  could  be  found.  He  gave  a  fluent  account  of  his 
vita  anteacta  and  only  here  and  there  was  it  necessary  to  question  him. 

*  The  word  is  used  in  the  sense  designated  by  the  Zurich  school, 
i.e.,  as  a  complex  of  ideas  of  marked  emotional  accentuation  which 
was  split  off  from  consciousness  and  repressed  into  the  unconscious. 


PSTCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  143 

He  stated  that  he  was  born  in  W.  near  Zurich.  His  mother  was  an 
invalid  for  years.  She  suffered  from  some  "nervous  trouble"  and 
died  when  he  was  about  ten  years  old.  His  father,  an  octogenarian, 
was  still  living.  He  knew  nothing  about  the  other  members  of  his 
family  for  since  his  eleventh  year  he  had  been  brought  up  among 
strangers.  Up  to  his  sixteenth  year  he  was  under  the  guidance  of  a 
clergyman  who  brought  him  up  very  religiously.  He  attended  school 
up  to  his  seventeenth  year  when  he  began  his  business  career  and  since 
his  twentieth  year  he  had  worked  in  the  bank  of  B.  He  saw  his  father 
quite  frequently  up  to  1903  when  there  was  a  disagreement  between 
them  ending  in  a  complete  estrangement.  When  asked  about  the 
cause  of  this  quarrel  he  at  first  refused  to  speak  of  it,  but  on  being 
urged  he  said :  "  The  last  time  my  father  was  in  B.  I  told  him  that  I 
would  like  to  marry  my  landlady,  a  widow,  in  whose  house  I  lived  for 
more  than  seven  years.  He  strongly  objected  and  threatened  to 
disown  me  should  I  disobey  him.  He  also  upbraided  me  for  my 
mode  of  living.  He  is  very  religious  and  antisemitic  while  I  was  an 
agnostic  and  worked  among  Jews  for  eighteen  years.  I  reminded 
him  that  I  was  old  enough  to  follow  my  own  inclinations  and  so 
we  parted.  Since  then  I  have  written  to  him  a  number  of  times,  but 
all  my  letters  have  been  returned  to  me." 

His  psychosis  he  described  as  follows:  "I  was  always  well  until  the 
beginning  of  February,  when  I  suddenly  became  thoughtful.  I  did 
not  sleep  well  and  was  very  nervous.  On  February  3,  1907,  at 
7  p.  m.,  I  was  alone  in  my  room  when  I  began  to  feel  a  strange  power 
influencing  me.  I  felt  ecstatic,  but  I  knew  that  there  was  something 
peculiar  in  me.  It  was  like  an  electric  magnetic  power  or  ether.  It 
suddenly  forced  me  down  on  the  floor  on  my  left  knee.  My  hands 
were  pressed  together  in  an  attitude  of  prayer  and  with  great  force 
I  cried  out:  'Lord,  have  mercy  on  suffering  humanity.'  I  spoke 
with  a  stentorian  voice  like  a  preacher.  I  repeated  the  '  Our  Father ' 
hundreds  of  times.  I  felt  an  influence  of  the  Egyptian  gods  Isis  and 
Osiris.  I  was  also  forced  to  repeat  numerous  times  'Am  I  Parsifal, 
the  guileless  fool?'  (Parsifal  reinster  Thor).  This  state  continued 
for  seventy-two  hours  during  which  I  did  not  sleep  at  all.  I  also 
imagined  that  I  was  very  wealthy.  The  whole  thing  was  like  a  colos- 
sal suggestive  influence  and  the  Jews  played  some  part  in  it.  After 
four  days  I  got  out  of  bed  and  took  a  walk  which  refreshed  me,  but 
I  caught  a  cold  which  continued  for  six  weeks.     During  that  time  I 


lit  PSYCHANALYSIS 

\\;is  imdor  the  magic  of  a  peculiar  suggestive  inspiration  in  which  the 
Jews  played  •  great  part." 

Asked  whether  he  heard  voices  talking  to  him  he  stated  that  he 
heard  none  during  t  he  first  crisis.  "  It  was  only  a  magnetic  suggestive 
force."  Continuing,  he  said:  "I  then  wrote  a  letter  to  my  firm  with 
whom  I  had  been  for  eighteen  years,  telling  them  that  my  present 
views  did  not  permit  me  to  work  for  a  Jewish  firm.  Following  an 
inspiration  I  went  to  Lucarno  where  I  remained  until  April  5.  I  then 
returned  to  B.  and  in  order  to  recover  completely  I  went  to  a  country 
place  near  the  sea  where  I  remained  for  five  weeks.  In  June  I  went 
to  see  my  father,  who  lived  in  K.,  Bohemia,  but  was  not  permitted 
to  see  him  as  his  doctor  forbade  it,  saying  he  was  too  sick.  I  could 
not  believe  that  the  doctor  told  me  the  truth.  It  was  certainly 
remarkable  that  my  old  father  should  estrange  himself  in  such  a 
manner  from  his  only  son.  At  the  end  of  June  I  was  offered  a  position 
in  Munich,  but  when  I  arrived  there  I  found  that  the  head  of  the  firm 
was  a  Jew  so  I  refused  it.  On  July  14,  a  letter  sent  to  my  father  was 
returned  marked  'Moved.  Address  unknown.'  I  again  became 
excited  and  felt  the  peculiar  suggestive  inspirations.  Such  inspira- 
tions were  never  in  me  before  and  probably  had  their  reasons 

I  again  went  to  K.,  arriving  there  on  July  16.  My  father's  residence 
was  locked  and  the  neighbors  told  me  that  he  had  moved  to  D.  I 
decided  to  follow  up  my  investigations  the  next  morning,  but  'Man 
proposes  and  God  disposes.'  I  passed  a  fearful  night.  I  was  con- 
tinually under  influences.  I  dreamed  that  I  climbed  a  high  mountain 
or  mountains  and  all  of  a  sudden  I  became  '  like  nailed '  and  I  could 
not  move  any  further.  I  was  afraid  of  falling  and  was  extremely 
terrified.  At  dawn  I  arose  and  decided  to  take  a  walk  in  the  forest, 
but  no  sooner  did  I  leave  the  hotel  when  I  suddenly  heard  a  voice  in 
my  ears.  I  looked  about  alarmed,  but  saw  no  one.  The  voice 
asked  me  peculiar  questions  and  gave  still  stranger  commands.  It 
was  something  like  telepathy.  I  almost  lost  my  mind.  I  noticed 
two  policemen  and  I  appealed  to  them  for  protection.  They  took 
me  to  the  police  station  and  then  I  only  faintly  recollect  being  taken 
to  a  hospital  in  a  cab.  I  was  in  an  unconscious,  peculiar,  feverish 
state.  I  heard  voices  constantly,  but  they  were  very  indistinct.  I 
saw  silhouettes  like  bluish  angelic  forms.  I  saw  my  father.  He  was 
God  and  I  was  the  Son,  and  Superintendent  R.  was  the  Holy  Ghost. 
I  was  in  that  condition  for  about  one  week  and  then  I  recovered  my 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  145 

senses.  They  then  sent  me  to  the  asylum  in  D.  and  on  November 
16  I  was  transferred  here." 

The  last  part  of  the  patient's  statements  concurs  with  the  hospital 
records  from  D.  He  finished  by  paraphrasing  Hamlet,  "There  are 
more  things  in  heaven  and  earth,  doctor,  than  are  dreamt  of  in  your 
psychiatry." 

An  attempt  was  made  to  have  the  patient  explain  some  of  the 
individual  points,  but  he  became  diplomatic  and  suspicious,  saying 
that  he  had  told  everything  to  the  best  of  his  ability  and  that  he 
really  could  not  remember  any  more.  Besides  he  was  sure  that  no 
doctor  could  understand  this  or  explain  it  to  him,  that  he  was  perfectly 
well  now  and  only  wished  to  be  discharged  so  that  he  might  go  and 
see  his  old  father.  When  asked  what  he  thought  of  the  whole  affair 
he  said  that  he  was  sure  the  whole  thing  was  something  divine  and 
supernatural  and  also  implied  that  he  understood  it  all.  No  amount 
of  urging,  however,  could  induce  him  to  enter  deeper  into  the  question. 

In  the  ward,  besides  his  seclusiveness,  nothing  abnormal  could  be 
noticed.  He  spent  most  of  his  time  in  reading.  He  also  wrote 
numerous  letters  to  his  father  and  friends,  telling  them  about  his 
strange  experiences,  and  assuring  them  that  he  was  now  completely 
changed  and  perfectly  well  both  physically  and  mentally.  During 
my  visits  he  was  always  affable,  but,  except  concerning  his  discharge, 
he  evinced  no  desire  to  enter  into  conversation.  When  an  attempt 
was  made  to  question  him  he  immediately  stated  "that  it  was  time 
wasted  and  that  he  had  told  me  all  he  knew,"  and  always  ended  with 
his  preferred  quotation,  mentioned  above,  "There  are  many  things, 
doctor,  etc."  Only  on  a  few  occasions  was  it  possible  to  induce  him 
to  explain  some  of  the  details. 

This  condition  remained  essentially  unchanged  for  more  than  two 
months  when  he  was  discharged:  Diagnosis,  dementia  precox. 

For  those  who  work  up  their  cases  on  a  Kraepelin- 

Wernicke  basis  the  problem,  if  not  solved,  is  finished.     To 

be  sure  the  case  could  be  elaborated  upon.     A  detailed 

description  of  the  various  incidents  could  be  given,  but 

no  matter  how  extensive  and  detailed  it  might  be  made, 

if  we  followed  Kraepelin  the  personal  factors  would  be 

very  meagerly,  if  at  all,  considered.     Indeed,  Kraepelin 
10 


14G  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

in  all  his  works,  gives  very  accurate  and  faithful  descrip- 
tions of  his  cases,  but  he  does  not  go  beyond  that.  It 
makes  no  difference  what  the  nature  of  a  special  case  may 
be  so  long  as  it  fulfils  certain  conditions  as  regards  the 
emotional  status,  morbid  perceptions,  delusions,  manner- 
isms, etc.  In  other  words  Kraepelin  totally  ignores  in- 
dividual psychology. 

However,  both  on  the  continent  and  in  this  country  the 
tendency  now  is  to  pay  more  attention  to  individual 
psychology.  Instigated  by  the  valuable  discoveries  of 
Freud,  the  Zurich  school  took  up  the  problem  and  the 
results,  as  every  one  knows,  are  most  gratifying.  In  this 
country  A.  Meyer  and  August  Hoch  approached  the  prob- 
lem from  a  somewhat  different  standpoint  but  came  to 
essentially  the  same  conclusions,  namely,  that  attention 
must  be  paid  to  the  actual  cases  and  that  a  mere  general 
description  does  not  suffice.  The  works  of  Bleuler,  Jung, 
Riklin  and  others  show  how  effete  and  soulless  the  old 
routine  methods  of  description  appear  in  comparison  to 
the  very  interesting  psychanalytic  methods  where  one 
finds  a  definite  relation  between  cause  and  effect.  In 
making  these  statements  I  do  not  wish  to  detract  in  any 
way  from  the  great  merits  of  Kraepelin  whose  epoch- 
making  works  in  modern  psychiatry  everyone  duly  recog- 
nizes; but  the  superiority  of  Kraepelin's  methods  over 
those  of  his  predecessors  only  serves  to  emphasize  their 
deficiencies  when  compared  to  the  psychanalytic  methods. 

As  aforesaid  it  was  impossible  to  draw  the  patient  into 
ordinary  conversation  for  any  length  of  time,  so  that  I 
started  by  taking  his  associations  and  then  analyzed  them. 
The  following  associations  are  given: 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND   THE    PSYCHOSES 


147 


Stimulus  Word 

Reaction 

Time* 

Reproduction 

1.  Coal 

Burning  Material 

3.4 

xt 

2.  Moderate 

Temperance 

4.2 

Wine  Beer 

3.  Song 

Singing  Club 

3.6 

X 

4.  To  Suppose 

To  Doubt 

5.2 

Religion 

5.  Pain 

Body 

2.6 

Physical  Pain 

6.  Lazy 

Schoolboy 

4.2 

Urchin 

7.  Moon 

Heaven 

3.6 

Venus 

8.  To  Laugh 

Society 

2.6 

X 

9.  Coffee 

Drink 

4.4 

Coffee  Table 

10.  Broad 

Board 

2.4 

X 

Ass.  1,  "coal-burning  material"  shows  a  long  reaction 
time.  This  is  frequently  seen  in  the  beginning  of  the 
experiment.  On  analysis  it  recalls  many  reminiscences 
of  his  youth  when  he  lived  in  the  coal  regions  of  B.  Ass.  2, 
"moderate — temperance — wine,  beer"  refers  to  his  com- 
plex of  drink.  At  the  age  of  twenty-five  he  drank  much 
beer,  his  father  often  spoke  to  him  about  moderation. 
Ass.  3,  "song — singing  club,"  recalls  the  singing  club  of  B. 
which  patient  often  visited,  it  especially  recalls  a  dirge 
which  he  once  heard  and  this  recalls  his  dead  sweetheart. 
Ass.  4,  "  to  suppose — to  doubt — religion"  refers  to  the  com- 
plex of  religion.  He  supposed  that  there  was  no  God  and 
he  doubted  all  religion,  but  now  he  is  quite  convinced  that 
the  contrary  is  true.  Ass.  5,  "pain — body — physical 
pain"  refers  to  rheumatic  pain  to  which  he  is  subject,  but 
mainly  to  the  pains  caused  by  his  father's  behavior  in 
ignoring  him.  Ass.  6,  "Lazy — schoolboy — urchin"  refers 
to  the  seven-year-old  son  of  the  widow  with  whom  he 

boarded.     Patient    showed    numerous    resistances    and 


*  The  time  is  indicated  in  seconds, 
f  X  =  correct  reproduction. 


lis 


PSYCHANALYSIS 


obstructions  and  finally  refused  to  continue  with  this 
association.  Ass.  7,  "moon — heaven — Venus."  Asked 
to  explain  this  strange  association  he  said:  "On  March 
28  I  awoke  during  the  night  and  there  was  a  beauti- 
ful moon.  I  had  a  suggestive  dream.  I  thought  that  it 
could  be  possible  to  walk  on  the  water  and  be  born  like 
Venus  was."  He  then  refused  to  continue,  but  after  many 
obstructions  and  inhibitions  he  said  that  by  water  he  means 
the  Atlantic  and  Venus  refers  to  his  sweetheart  who  died 
in  America.  The  day  before,  he  saw  a  picture  in  the 
Berliner  Illustrierte  Zeitung  of  a  newly  discovered  "sea- 
people"  with  webbed  fingers  and  toes  who  either  barked 
or  prayed  to  the  moon.  Ass.  9,  "coffee — drink — coffee 
table"  recalls  a  friend  in  Guatemala,  a  coffee  planter,  who 
just  married  a  Swiss  girl  and  this  recalls  his  "first  and  only 
sweetheart"  who  married  in  America.  This  may  also 
refer  to  his  drinking  complex.     Ass.  10,  "broad-board" 


den  obstruction) 

l  \^\s     UL  U  i  1  1\  ,      Kl. 

Stimulus  Word 

Reaction 

Time 

Reproduction 

11.  Air 

Ether 

3.4 

Body 

12.  To  frighten 

Oh  terror 

4.2 

To  collapse 

13.  Plate 

Table 

2.0 

X 

14.  Tired 

Walk 

3.2 

X 

15.  Intention 

Resolution 

6.0 

Determination  of  will 

16.  To  fly 

Bird 

1.8 

X 

17.  Eye 

Head 

4.8 

Angel 

18.  Fruit 

Vegetable 

3.0 

X 

20.  To  work 

Office 

2.2 

X 

21.  To  sail 

Ocean 

4.8 

X 

22.  Modest 

Virtue 

7.4 

Quality 

2:;.  Soil 

Earth 

3.2 

X 

21.  To  whistle 

Schoolboy 

2.2 

X 

PSYCHANALYSIS    AND   THE    PSYCHOSES  149 

Ass.  11,  "air — ether — body"  refers  to  ether  which  filled 
his  body  during  his  first  attack.  Ass.  12,  "to  frighten — 
oh  terror — to  collapse"  is  explained  as  follows:  "When  I 
first  heard  the  voices  in  K.  I  became  so  terrified  that  I 
almost  collapsed.  It  was  so  real,  as  though  some  one 
was  near  me.  I  remained  'like  nailed.'  Then  I  called 
out  'who  talks  to  me  and  what  is  your  name?'  The 
voice  replied  '  water,  drink  water.' "  (See  Ass.  7.)  It 
was  so  terrible,  especially  after  the  frightful  night,  I 
did  not  sleep  at  all  during  that  night.  I  thought  some  one 
was  in  the  room  and  I  looked  under  the  bed,  but  I  found 
no  one.  I  also  dreamed  of  climbing  mountains.  I  arose 
at  5.30  and  then  a  suggestive  thought  almost  like  a  voice 
said:  'Jump  from  the  fourth  floor  window  and  if  you 
believe  you  will  rise  unharmed.'  Then  another  sugges- 
tion said  'How  can  you  do  it,  you  are  only  a  sinner'  and 
then  I  left  the  hotel.  Ass.  14,  "intention — resolution — ■ 
determination  of  will"  is  explained  as  follows:  "Between 
1890  and  1895  I  drank  considerably.  Then  I  formed  a 
resolution  not  to  drink  and  I  was  a  total  abstainer  until 
1899  when  I  was  operated  upon  for  hemorrhoids.  Since 
then  I  drank  moderately.  I  also  resolved  never  to 
marry.  When  I  was  twenty-two  I  had  a  sweetheart,  a 
very  pretty  girl,  Marie  Biere.  I  was  very  anxious  to 
marry  her,  but  my  father  objected  to  it,  saying  that  I  was 
only  a  young  fool,  etc.  In  1887  she  went  to  America,  to 
Pittsburgh,  Pa.,  but  before  going  we  promised  to  be  true 
to  each  other.  In  1888  I  heard  she  married  a  Swiss  in 
Pittsburgh.  I  was  very  dejected.  It  was  my  first  real 
and  true  love.  I  had  many  sweethearts  after  that,  but  I 
never  loved  another  woman.     I  then  went  to  Paris  and 


150 


l'S'Hll  ANALYSIS 


just  cast  myself  into  the  whirl  so  as  to  forget  everything 
and  I  finally  forgot  her.  In  1891 1  heard  she  died."  (While 
reciting  this  the  patient  became  very  emotional).  Ass.  17, 
"eye — head — angel"  recalls  his  father's  head,  "he  has  a 
wonderful  eye  like  Bismark — it  is  God's  eye."  (He  has 
only  one  eye).  (In  his  delirium  his  father  was  God,  etc., 
see  above.)  Ass.  21,  "sail — ocean"  shows  a  very  long 
reaction  time.  He  thinks  of  America  where  he  was  so 
very  anxious  to  go,  but  his  father  objected.  Ass.  22, 
"modest — virtue — quality"  cannot  be  explained.  He 
began  to  speak  of  modest  women  but  suddenly  stopped. 
It  probably  has  some  erotic  sense.*  Ass.  23,"  soil — earth  " 
shows  a  long  reaction  time  due  to  a  perseveration  of  former 
reaction;  probably  refers  to  dream  about  birth  of  Venus. 
Ass.  24,  "whistle — schoolboy"  is  another  reference  to  the 
boy  mentioned  in  Ass.  6;  he  showed  many  obstructions 
and  finally  asked  not  to  be  questioned  about  it.  Ass.  25, 
"aim — intention"  is  a  perseveration  of  the  former — he 
says  "Everything  has  its  reasons,  dress  is  only  to  cover 
the  body" — probably  some  erotic  complex. 


Stimulus  Word 

Reaction 

Time 

Reproduction 

26.  Hat 

Summer 

3.4 

X 

27.  Hand 

Body 

2.6 

God's  hand 

28.  To  wake 

In  bed 

2.4 

To  get  out  of  bed 

29.  Apple 

You  have  I  believe 

3.8 

Fruit  tree  vegetables 

30.  Evil 

Quality 

2.6 

X 

31.  Mouth 

Head 

3.6 

Boy 

32.  To  drink 

Thirst 

3.4 

An  inn 

33.   Bed 

To  sleep 

2.6 

X 

34.  Pretty 

Pretty  girl 

4.4 

Beer 

35.  Danger 

Mountain 

5.0 

Mountain  fall 

*  The  word  is  used  in  its  original  Greek  sense,  as  anything  apper- 
taining to  love — eros. 


Time 

Reproduction 

3.0 

X 

2.2 

X 

2.6 

X 

2.4 

Carpenter 

4.0 

School 

PSYCHANALYSIS    AND   THE    PSYCHOSES  151 

Stimulus  Word  Reaction 

36.  To  visit  Friends 

37.  Laborer  Mason 

38.  High  Mountain 

39.  Axe  Instrument 

40.  To  observe  Adjective 

Ass.  27,  "hand— body — God's  hand"  is  not  explained, 
but  it  probably  refers  to  his  religious  complex.  Ass.  28, 
"to  wake — in  bed — to  get  out  of  bed"  refers  to  expression 
"wide  awake  boy"  and  this  again  recalls  the  son  of  his 
landlady  (obstruction  emotivity).  Ass.,  29  "apple — you 
have  I  believe — fruit  tree  vegetables"  is  a  perseveration  of 
former  reaction,  or  may  have  an  erotic  sense — he  is 
unable  "to  explain  it."  Ass.  30,  "evil — quality"  evokes 
"bad  boy"  meaning  the  landlady's  boy  as  does  the 
following  Ass.  31,"  mouth — head — boy"  which  he  explains 
as  "human  mouth  connected  with  chewing, eating, etc." — 
mother's  mouth — "I  have  never  done  such  dirty  things." 
Asked  to  explain  what  he  means  he  at  first  refused  to 
continue  and  on  being  urged  he  said  "I  think  of  the  scenes 
that  I  witnessed  in  Paris."  This  was  followed  by  a  sudden 
outburst  of  excitement.  He  jumped  up  and  talked  very 
excitedly.  He  saw  no  reason  why  he  should  be  forced  to 
talk  of  such  dirty  things,  that  he  never  would  think  of  it 
if  not  for  the  experiments,  etc.  He  was  so  irritable  that 
the  analysis  had  to  be  stopped  for  a  week.  Ass.  32, 
"drink — thirst — inn"  refers  to  his  alcoholic  complex. 
Ass.  34,  "pretty — pretty  girl — beer"  refers  to  his  sweet- 
heart whose  name  was  Biere.  Ass.  35, "  danger — mountain 
— mountain  fall"  refers  to  his  dreams  of  mountain 
climbing.  He  also  stated  that  he  was  once  in  danger  of 
falling  off  a  steep  mountain  and  was  only  saved  by  the 


152 


I'SYCIIANALYMS 


timely  arrival  of  a  mountain  guide.  Ass.  38,  "high — 
mountain"  again  refers  to  his  mountain  climbing  and 
also  to  the  frightful  dreams  about  climbing  at  the  onset 
of  the  second  crisis.  Ass  40,  "to  observe — adjective- 
school"  refers  again  to  the  schoolboy  and,  as  usual,  the 
patient  could  not  "explain  it." 


Stimulus  Word 

Reaction 

Time 

Reproduction 

41.  Road 

I  also  think  of  a  lawn 

4.0 

Forest 

42.  Round 

Globe 

2.2 

X 

43.  Blood 

Operation 

5.2 

Knight 

44.  To  state 

School 

4.2 

Schoolboy 

45.  Attention 

da-danger 

4.8 

Quality 

46.  Gay 

Society 

3.2 

X 

47.  Market 

Stock  market 

4.2 

Money 

48.  To  forget 

Time 

5.4 

Love 

49.  Drum 

Carnival 

3.6 

X 

50.  Free 

Air 

4.8 

X 

Ass.  41,  "road — I  also  think  of  a  lawn-forest"  refers  to 
the  morning  of  his  second  attack  when  he  arose  early  to  go 
into  the  forest.  Ass.  43,  "  blood— operation— knight "  the 
patient  states  that  in  1899  he  underwent  an  operation  for 
hemorrhoids  during  which  he  lost  much  blood.  It  also 
recalls  the  blood  of  the  grail  referred  to  in  Parsifal.  From 
blood  he  also  goes  to  the  word  "blutt"  which  means 
naked  and  this  recalls  a  dream  fragment  about  arms  and 
breasts  which  he  had  on  the  night  of  July  16.  Ass.  44, 
"to  state — school — schoolboy"  refers  again  to  his  land- 
lady's boy.  Ass.  45,  "attention — da-danger — quality" 
refers  to  his  last  attack  when  the  voices  addressed  him. 
Ass.  47,  "market — stock  market — money"  refers  to  his 
trade  complex.  Ass.  48,  "to  forget — time — love"  he 
explained  as  follows:  "love  is  in  time  forgotten."  Ass.  50, 
"free — air"  refers  to  his  confinement. 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND   THE    PSYCHOSES 


153 


Stimulus  Word 

Reaction 

Time 

Reproduction 

51.  Religion 

The  living 

word 

4.2 

Thomas 

52.  Jews 

Deutches  Volksblatt 

3.4 

Rich 

53.  Isis 

Osiris 

3.0 

Banker 

54.  Widow 

Wehrli 

2.6 

X 

55.  Parsifal 

Knight 

4.0 

Guileless  fool 

56.  Father 

Love 

2.8 

X 

Ass.  51,  "religion — the  living  word — Thomas"  was 
explained  as  follows:  "Despite  my  being  brought  up 
religiously  I  became  a  free-thinker  and  for  years  I  never 
thought  of  religion.  I  scoffed  at  everything.  I  was  the 
real  'doubting  Thomas.'  I  studied  Nietzsche  and  es- 
pecially Max  Stirner,  whose  last  book  'Der  Einzige  u. 
sein  Eigentum  (The  Ego  and  His  Own) '  has  the  motto, 
'All  things  are  nothing  with  me.'  It  is  a  very  dangerous 
book.  But  all  my  ideas  and  plans  have  been  crushed 
because  I  could  not  conceive  the  real  and  holy  religion. 
What  happened  to  me  within  the  last  year  is  a  sign  sent 
from  above,  'the  true  living  word'  which  forces  me 
to  seek  God.  I  have  still  something  of  the  'doubting 
Thomas,'  but  it  will  soon  disappear."  Ass.  52,  "Jews — 
Deutsches  Volksblatt — rich."  Patient  denied  bearing 
any  animosity  against  Jews.  He  worked  eighteen  years 
with  Jews  and  always  got  along  very  nicely  with  them. 
"They  are  very  nice  rich  people,"  he  said,  but  for  some 
reason  which  he  is  unable  to  explain  he  was  a  constant 
subscriber  to  the  Deutsches  Volksblatt,  which  he  claims 
is  an  antisemitic  journal.  Ass.  53,  "Isis — Osiris — 
banker"  refers  to  Mr.  Osiris,  a  very  wealthy  banker  in 
Basel,  who  died  before  the  patient's  first  attack.  The 
patient  says  that  he  now  recalls  that  during  the  first 
attack  he  had  the  idea  that  this  banker  left  him  30,000,000 


154  PSYCHANALYSIS 

francs.  Some  one  told  him  so.  He  denies  ever  having 
had  any  relations  with  Mr.  Osiris.  Osiris  is  a  contiguous 
association  of  Isis.  Ass.  54,  "widow — Wehrli"  refers  to 
Mrs.  Wehrli,  his  landlady,  with  whom  he  boarded  for 
seven  years.  He  stated  that  he  really  did  not  love  her, 
but  he  liked  her  and  seriously  thought  of  marrying  her. 
In  1903  lie  spoke  about  it  to  his  father  who  objected  to  it. 
After  Christmas,  1907,  he  resolved  to  save  money  and  then 
marry  her,  but  since  the  last  attack  he  gave  up  the  idea. 
Ass.  55,  "Parsifal — knight — guileless  fool"  refers  to  Parsi- 
fal as  depicted  in  Wagner's  opera,  where  he  is  named  the 
guileless  fool.  Patient  seemed  to  identify  himself  with 
the  knight,  but  did  not  fully  explain  it.  Like  Parsifal  he 
had  to  undergo  many  vicissitudes  before  recognizing  the 
true  religion.  But  we  shall  return  to  this  later.  Ass.  56, 
"father — love"  is  not  fully  explained.  Patient  said: 
"There  were  times  during  which  I  almost  hated  my  father, 
but  now  I  am  very  much  concerned  about  him  and  am 
very  anxious  to  see  him." 

One  hundred  and  fifty  associations  have  been  taken  from 
the  patient,  but  the  given  associations  are  sufficient  for  the 
explanation  of  the  principal  complexes  and  to  give  us  a 
fair  understanding  of  the  symptomatic  ideogenesis.  The 
main  characteristics  of  the  associations  are  the  long 
reaction  times  and  faulty  reproductions.  As  we  have 
said  above  the  average  reaction  time  of  persons  of  his  type 
is  taken  as  2.4  seconds.  In  the  associations  given  about 
84  per  cent,  are  above  the  normal  reaction  time  and  only 
about  43  per  cent,  of  the  reactions  are  correctly  reproduced. 
These  are  the  so-called  complex-indicators  and  wherever 
they  occur  are  taken  as  signs  of  complex  constellations. 


PSYCH  ANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  155 

The  stimulus  word  either  consciously  or  unconsciously 
touched  the  complex,  and  this  evoked  the  intervention  of  a 
presentation  of  strong  emotional  tone.  This  always  happens 
in  normal  and  neurotic  individuals,  and  Jung  has  shown 
that  the  same  holds  true  in  Dementia  Prsecox. 

When  we  examine  the  nature  of  the  associations  we 
find  that  sixteen  (3,  7,  9,  15,  21,  22,  23,  25,  29,  31,  34,  35, 
45,  53,  54,  58)  belong  to  the  erotic  complex,  seven  (4,  11, 
12,  27,  43,  51,  52)  to  the  complex  of  religion  and  six 
(6,  24,  28,  30,  31,  40)  directly  concern  the  "boy."  Unfor- 
tunately the  last  associations  were  not  satisfactorily 
explained  by  the  patient.  Judging  from  the  very  strong 
repression  which  dominated  them  we  are  quite  certain 
that  they  play  a  great  part  in  the  patient's  psyche.  Two 
suppositions  should  be  kept  in  mind: 

(1)  Patient  may  be  the  father  of  the  boy. 

(2)  There  may  have  been  some  homosexual  relations 
between  them.  In  favor  of  (1)  is  the  fact  that  he  boarded 
for  more  than  seven  years  with  the  boy's  mother  (the 
boy  was  about  seven  years  old).  A  number  of  letters 
exchanged  between  the  patient  and  his  landlady  point 
to  that.  If  he  is  not  his  son  there  probably  was  some 
homosexual  relation  between  them  as  shown  by  Ass.  31. 
We  are  therefore  perfectly  justified  in  adding  these  six 
associations  to  the  erotic  which  gives  a  total  of  twenty- 
two.  The  religious  complexes,  too,  are  intimately  con- 
nected with  the  erotic. 

Bearing  this  in  mind  we  can  form  an  idea  of  the  part 
played  by  the  erotic  in  the  patient's  psyche.  We  can  say 
that  almost  all  his  psychical  components  when  thoroughly 
analyzed   show   some   relation   to   it.     This   may   seem 


156  PSYCHANALYSIS 

peculiar,  but  it  is  not  at  all  unusual,  it  is  found  in  all 
psychoneurosea  as  well  as  in  the  normal.  According  to 
Freud  all  so-called  day  dreams  in  women  are  of  an  erotic 
nature.8  In  men  they  may  be  of  an  erotic  or  ambitious 
nature,  but  whenever  it  is  possible  to  analyze  the  ambitious 
reveries  they,  too,  may  be  found  to  belong  to  the  erotic. 
All  great  actions  and  accomplishments,  heroic  or  commer- 
cial, are  generally  done  for  the  purpose  of  pleasing  some 
woman  and  to  be  preferred  to  other  men.  That  our 
patient  is  no  exception  to  the  rule  is  quite  natural. 

RECAPITULATION 

We  have  here  a  man  of  thirty-nine  years  old  suffering 
from  a  psychosis  of  a  year's  duration.  He  cannot  account 
for  it.  He  thinks  it  came  on  suddenly.  Only  a  few  days 
before  the  onset  he  was  thoughtful  and  nervous.  This 
psychosis  is  characterized  by  two  distinct  crises  with  a 
transitional  period  of  about  five  months.  Both  crises 
were  of  the  delirious,  confusional,  dream-like  type,  the 
first  lasting  three  days,  and  the  second  about  one  week. 
The  period  of  transition  is  characterized  by  marked  rest- 
lessness, delusions  and  hallucinations.  The  second  crisis 
was  not  followed  by  any  recovery  in  the  strict  sense,  as  he 
still  entertained  false  ideas  which  he  did  not  try  to  correct. 
On  the  contrary  he  considered  all  attempts  in  that  direc- 
tion futile  and  unnecessary.  The  strange  manifestations 
he  recognized  as  supernatural,  divine  and  purposeful; 
they  were  intentionally  sent  to  compel  him  to  change  his 
mode  of  living  and  return  to  the  religion  of  his  father. 
He  sees  in  all  this  the  "  Hand  of  God."  In  other  words, 
we  see  here  a  gradual  and  systematic  change  of  personality 


PSYCHANALYSIS   AND   THE    PSYCHOSES  157 

which  we  have  every  reason  to  believe  is  only  the  process 
of  transformation  and  will  probably  lead  to  further 
systematization  and  dissociation.* 

Both  the  abstract  of  the  history  and  the  patient's 
katamnestic  account  give  a  fair  gross  picture  of  the  psy- 
chosis, but  do  not  in  any  way  explain  the  psychogenesis 
of  the  symptoms.  The  associations,  as  can  be  seen,  have 
thrown  considerable  light  on  the  subject,  they  uncovered 
many  obscure  points  and  called  forth  many  new  ones, 
but  we  are  still  in  darkness  concerning  the  causal  deter- 
minations of  the  symptoms  which  we  shall  now  proceed  to 
examine. 

That  the  psychosis  did  not  come  on  as  suddenly  as 
would  appear  is  quite  certain.  When  we  thoroughly 
examine  the  patient's  antecedent  history  we  find  that  for 
a  number  of  years  his  mind  was  gradually  being  pre- 
pared for  it.  Since  his  twenty-second  year  he  sustained 
a  number  of  psychic  shocks  of  different  degrees.  The 
first  and  most  important  was  his  love  affair  with  Miss  B. 
which  ended  so  unfortunately.  To  form  an  opinion  of  the 
effect  it  left  on  the  patient  it  was  only  necessary  to  watch 
his  mimicry  while  he  recited  this  episode.  As  we  know  it  is 
very  difficult  to  evoke  an  adequate  affect  in  such  patients, 
but  when  this  unhappy  love  affair  of  sixteen  years  ago 
was  touched  he  immediately  lost  his  wonted  taciturnity 
and  indifference,  his  eyes  brightened  and  his  face  red- 
dened. He  was  again  the  young  lover  of  twenty-two. 
He  spoke  fluently  about  his  ardent  affections:  "I  was  then 
innocent  and    really  loved.     It  was    my  first  and  true 

*  Nothing  has  been  heard  from  the  patient  since  his  discharge 
from  the  hospital. 


158  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

love.  All  the  other  love  affairs  which  I  subsequently 
entertained  were  dulled  by  this  first  one."  He  became 
enraged  when  lie  recalled  his  father's  attitude  in  this 
affair.  "Whenever  I  think  of  it  I  am  compelled  to  hate 
him,"  he  said.  It  is  not  difficult  to  see  that  this  love  was 
always  in  his  mind  in  a  repressed  state  and  that  it  mark- 
edly influenced  his  actions. 

In  1901  he  loved  another  woman,  Miss  I.  W.  "It  was 
only  sexual  love,"  he  said,  "but  I  would  have  married 
her."  She  proved  false  to  him  and  married  an  army 
officer.  In  1903  he  decided  to  marry  his  landlady  and  his 
father  again  obj ected.  This  time,  however,  he  disregarded 
his  father  and  resolved  to  follow  his  own  inclinations.  As 
a  result  his  father  severed  all  relations  with  him  and 
he  neither  saw  nor  heard  from  him  for  three  years,  yet 
this  did  not  seem  to  disturb  him.  But  in  spite  of  all  he 
did  not  marry  Mrs.  W.  For  reasons  unexplained  he 
kept  on  putting  it  off  until  Christmas,  1907,  when  he 
finally  resolved  to  save  his  money  and  marry  her.  But 
at  the  same  time  there  was  a  reawakening  of  paternal 
sentiment.  He  sent  his  father  letters  and  his  photograph, 
but  they  were  all  returned.  This  irritated  him  and  he 
decided  never  to  write  to  him  again.  As  we  have  shown 
he  did  not  keep  his  resolutions. 

Besides  the  episodes  mentioned  there  were  probably 
other  psychical  disturbances,  but  unfortunately  the 
patient  was  not  very  communicative.  We  also  see  quite 
plainly  that  for  a  number  of  years  he  was  subjected  to  a 
mental  conflict.  As  a  youth  he  was  brought  up  amid 
religious  surroundings.  His  father  was  antisemitic  and 
naturally    the    same    ideas    were    inculcated    in    the    son. 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND   THE    PSYCHOSES  159 

When  he  became  older  he  changed  completely.  He 
became  an  atheist  and  worked  among  Jews  for  eighteen 
years.  He  no  longer  attended  church,  but  studied  Nietz- 
sche, Stirner  and  others.  Now  and  then  his  father 
upbraided  him  for  it,  but  without  avail.  That  he  did  not 
entirely  rid  himself  of  his  early  religious  training,  but  only 
repressed  it,  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  he  kept  on  sub- 
scribing to  an  antisemitic  journal  and  during  the  Dreyfus 
affair,  he  was  the  only  anti-Dreyfussard  in  his  office.  He 
could  not  be  convinced  that  Dreyfus  was  not  guilty 
(symbolic  actions).  Unconsciously  his  early  training 
remained  in  a  dormant  state.  It  is  not  at  all  easy  for  one 
who  has  been  brought  up  in  a  certain  religious  atmosphere 
to  his  sixteenth  year  to  entirely  free  himself  from  it.  Many 
persons  imagine  that  they  are  entirely  emancipated  from 
their  early  religious  training  and  are  manifestly  so  until 
a  grave  moment  intervenes.  Then,  provided  they  are 
mentally  strong,  the  repressed  ideas  reassert  themselves. 
This  accounts  for  the  many  so-called  conversions  and 
recantations  during  grave  diseases  or  on  death  beds. 

Both  the  patient's  crises  show  some  connection  with 
religious  events.  Christmas,  1907,  marks  the  manifest 
beginning  of  his  restlessness.  At  this  time  his  feelings 
toward  his  father  suddenly  changed.  The  suggestive 
dream  referred  to  under  Ass.  7  was  on  the  evening  of 
Good  Friday  and  marked  the  beginning  of  the  second 
attack.*  The  day  following  the  dream  he  set  out  on  the 
journey  which  finally  landed  him  in  the  hospital  of  K. 

We  see,  then,  that  we  have  at  least  two  psychic  instances 

*  The   episode   in   Wagner's   Parsifal   also   revolves   around   Good 
Friday. 


100  PSYCHANALYSIS 

of  groat  moment  which  have  long  been  repressed  and 
which  now  suddenly  reasserted  themselves.  The  question 
arises— how  did  this  come  about?  A  personal  predispo- 
sition is  presupposed.  The  conflict  existing  for  years 
caused  an  "abaisment  du  niveau  mental"  (Janet).4  The 
repressed  unconscious  complexes  gradually  freed  them- 
selves from  the  domination  of  the  ego-complex5  and 
then  manifested  themselves  in  the  form  of  automatisms, 
such  as  suggestions  and  inspirations  and  finally  as 
hallucinations.  The  obnubilation  which  followed  allowed 
the  appearance  of  the  manifold  senseless  manifestations 
which  were  brought  about  by  the  dream  mechanisms  de- 
scribed by  Freud. 

If  this  supposition  is  true,  the  individual  symptoms 
ought  to  be  psychically  constellated  by  the  complexes. 
I  shall  forthwith  show  that  this  is  really  the  case. 

When  we  look  at  our  cases  in  the  wards  we  are  often 
struck  by  their  strange  utterances  and  peculiar  behaviour. 
Until  recently  wre  were  quite  satisfied  to  note  that  the 
patient  is  delusional  and  demented,  that  he  utters  sense- 
less phrases  and  goes  through  a  number  of  peculiar  actions. 
Thanks  to  Freud  we  know  that  all  actions  and  speech  in 
both  normal  and  abnormal  individuals  are  psychically 
determined.6  Jung,  following  Freud,  made  thorough 
analyses  of  cases  of  Dementia  Prsecox  showing  that  all 
the  patients'  absurd  utterings  were  quite  relevant  when 
analyzed  and,  furthermore,  that  all  the  speech  and  motor 
manifestations  were  distinctly  traced  to  the  complex.7 

Let  us  now  examine  the  individual  symptoms  of  our 
patient.  The  crises  which  we  went  through  can  be  readily 
compared  to  the  normal  dream.     Like  the  expressions 


PSYCHAXALYSIS    AXD    THE    PSYCHOSES  161 

in  dreams  our  patient's  utterances  at  first  sight  seem  quite 
senseless,  but  have  a  meaning  as  soon  as  analyzed.  The 
first  crisis  began  with  an  ecstatic  feeling.  He  was  forced 
into  an  attitude  of  prayer  by  an  invisible  force.  He  had 
to  cry  out,  "Lord,  have  mercy  on  suffering  humanity." 
This  is  nothing  but  a  powerful  reassertion  of  his  repressed 
religious  presentations,  which  by  his  impaired  judgment 
can  only  be  interpreted  as  an  external  power.  The  com- 
plex of  religion  gained  the  upper  hand  and  he  was  therefore 
forced  to  assume  an  attitude  of  prayer  and  cry  out, 
"Lord,  have  mercy,  etc."  He  also  had  to  repeat  the 
"Our  Father"  hundreds  of  times.  As  we  know  his  father 
played  a  great  part  in  this  attack,  hence  the  frequent 
repetition.  The  directing  thought  being  absent  the 
vacuum  of  association  causes  the  stereotyped  repetition. 
It  must  also  be  remembered  that  he  identified  himself 
with  Christ  and  his  father  with  God.  Hence  he  repeated 
the  Lord's  prayer. 

The  influence  of  the  Egyptian  gods,  Isis  and  Osiris,  is 
explained  in  Ass.  53.  The  death  of  Mr.  Osiris  naturally 
interested  him  as  he  was  a  bank  official.  It  is  quite 
likely  that  either  consciously  or  unconsciously  he  expressed 
a  wish  that  some  of  the  money  would  be  left  to  him.  The 
delirium,  like  the  dream,  fulfilled  that  wish  and  he,  there- 
fore, imagined  that  the  banker  left  him  thirty  million 
francs.  Osiris,  is  a  contiguous  association  of  Isis.  Hence 
he  felt  the  influence  of  Isis  and  Osiris. 

Why  was  he  forced  to  repeat  "Am  I  Parsifal,  the  guile- 
less fool?"  In  order  to  understand  this  analysis  it  is  neces- 
sary to  bear  in  mind  the  original  German.     He  kept  on 

repeating   "Am   I  Parsifal   reinster   Thor."     Those   ac- 
n 


162  rsYcllANAMSIS 

quainted  with  Freud's  mot  hods  of  analyzing  dreams  know 
what  a  great  pari  is  played  by  "condensation"  and  "con- 
bamination."*  On  carefully  examining  the  patient's 
doings  of  the  day  before  his  first  crisis  it  was  found  that  on 
looking  over  some  old  papers  and  correspondence  he  found 
many  letters  from  his  old  sweetheart.  He  stated  that  he 
did  not  attempt  to  read  them,  but  he  happened  to  notice 
the  following  sentence:  "  I  am  in  Pittsburgh,  Pennsylvania, 
with  a  family  named  Thaw."  This  was  the  first  letter  she 
sent  him  from  America  in  which  she  told  him  that  she  was 
a  servant  in  the  Thaw  family.  She  remained  with  this 
family  for  some  time  and  he  corresponded  with  her  regu- 
larly for  about  a  year.  He  stated  that  after  noticing  this 
sentence  it  "sort  of  possessed  him"  and  for  hours  he  was 
compelled  to  repeat  in  his  mind  "Pittsburgh,  Pennsyl- 
vania, Thaw."  He  spoke  English  fairly  well  and  had  a 
very  good  reading  knowledge  of  it.  On  being  requested  to 
write  this  phrase  he  wrote  it  as  follows:  "Pa.,  Pittsburgh, 
Tha w, "  remarking  at  the  same  time  that  Pa.  is  the  abbrevia- 
tion for  Pennsylvania.  I  now  venture  the  following  ex- 
planation. The  memory  picture  of  the  word  Pennsylvania 
may  be  the  whole  word  or  its  abbreviation  Pa.,  hence  in 
the  mind  they  exist  simultaneously  as  Pa.,  Pennsylvania. 
The  dream  does  not  find  it  difficult  to  condense  Pa. 
Pennsylvania  into  Pannsylvania  and  then  form  it  into 
PANNSYVLania  which  corresponds  to  Parsifal.  The 
resemblance  between  Thaw  and  Thor  is  quite  obvious. 
If  we  now  place  the  two  sentences  parallel  to  each  other 
we  have  the  following: 

*  Condensation  is  a  fusion  of  events,  pictures,  and  elements  of 
speech.     Contamination  is  a  fusion  of  speech  only  (Jung). 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  163 

PANNSYVLania        Pittsburg        THAW 
PARSIFAL  reinster  THOR 

All  letters  for  the  pronunciation  of  "reinster"  can 
readily  be  found  in  the  word  Pittsburgh  and  the  remnant 
of  Pennsylvania.  Such  condensations  and  transpositions 
happen  quite  frequently  in  dreams,  especially  if  there  be 
another  determining  factor.  Our  patient  imperfectly 
identified  himself  with  Parsifal  as  shown  in  Ass.  55. 

"The  Jews  played  some  part  in  it"  is  all  we  could  get 
from  our  patient.  He  insisted  that  he  never  had  any 
differences  with  Jews.  What  part  they  played  in  his  attack 
cannot  be  explained,  but.it  may  simply  have  been  a  forc- 
ible reassertion  of  his  father's  doctrines. 

Thus  we  see  that  all  the  known  senseless  utterances  of 
the  first  crisis  are  fairly  well  determined.  Let  us  now 
turn  to  the  second  crisis. 

He  was  quite  sure  that  during  the  first  attack  he  heard 
no  distinct  voices.  Everything  was  accomplished  by 
some  strange  power  which  he  designates  as  magnetic 
electric  mental  suggestion.  These  suggestions,  although 
abating  after  the  first  crisis,  did  not  entirely  cease.  He 
said  that  he  was  all  the  time  more  or  less  under  sugges- 
tions. On  July  16  he  reached  K.  and  passed  a  very  restless 
night  there.  He  slept  but  little  and  was  constantly 
troubled  by  frightful  dreams. 

When  the  patient  was  asked  to  recount  the  dreams 
he  only  remembered  about  "climbing  a  high  mountain 
or  mountains,"  that  he  suddenly  became  "like  nailed" 
and   could   go   no  further,  and   that   he   "experienced  in- 


104  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

tense  fear."  (On  another  occasion  he  claimed  to  have 
dreamed  about  round  arms  and  breasts.  See  explanation 
of  Ass.  43.)  When  an  attempt  was  made  to  analyze  it 
he  absolutely  refused  all  collaboration.  Notwithstanding 
this  we  know  enough  about  dreams  to  enable  us  to  venture 
an  opinion.  Since  the  first  crisis  he  was  under  great  mental 
stress.  The  conflict  was  "Shall  I  abide  by  my  decisions 
and  marry  Mrs.  W.  or  shall  I  comply  with  my  father's 
w'shes."  As  we  know  he  had  for  years  planned  to  marry 
in  spite  of  his  father's  objections  and  about  Christmas 
time  was  fully  determined  to  do  it  when  a  sudden  reaction 
set  in  and  his  repressed  complexes  predominated.  The 
mountain  climbing  is  a  symbolic  representation  of  this 
struggle.  He  was  about  to  consummate  his  determination 
when  he  became  "like  nailed  and  could  go  no  further." 
In  the  dream  the  sensation  of  being  inhibited,  such  as  not 
being  able  to  move  or  run  when  one  most  desires  to  do  so, 
means  "no."  There  is  a  conflict  of  the  will.  One 
begins  to  do  something  and  the  censor  says  "No,  that 
shall  not  be  done."  He  was  about  to  overcome  all 
parental  scruples.  After  years  he  finally  decided  to 
disregard  his  father  and  marry  when  he  was  suddenly 
checked. 

This  is  quite  a  plausible  and  innocent  interpretation, 
but  like  every  harmless  self  evident  dream  it  is  only  con- 
cealing something  deeper  and  more  intimate.  The  fear 
and  anxiety  in  this  dream  show  us  that  we  deal  with  in- 
tense psychic  resistance  the  content  of  which  belongs  to 
the  erotic.  Dreams  accompanied  by  fear  always  belong 
to  the  sexual.     "Anxiety  is  a  libidinous  impulse  emanat- 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  165 

ing  from  the  unconscious  and  inhibited  by  the  fore-con- 
scious." (Freud.)  In  the  waking  state  we  find  its  counter- 
part in  the  psychoneuroses.8  We  know  also  that  he 
dreamed  of  "round  arms  and  breasts."  Round  arms  and 
breasts  are  woman's  arms  and  breasts.  The  mountains  or 
mountain  in  the  dream  probably  meant  "mons  veneris." 
The  German  expression  for  mons  veneris  is  well  known  to 
the  patient.  As  shown  above  he  also  dreamed  of  Venus 
and  of  her  birth.  This  shows  the  sexual  part  of  the 
dream.  This  is  further  strengthened  by  the  fact  that 
since  his  first  crisis  he  was  a  sexual  abstainer.  Suppressed 
sexuality  manifests  itself  in  fear. 

The  onset  of  the  second  crisis  was  even  more  intense 
than  the  first.  It  began  with  suggestions  and  soon 
merged  into  distinct  voices.  While  dressing  the  suggestive 
thought  "almost  like  a  voice  said  'jump  from  the  fourth 
floor  window  and  if  you  believe  you  will  rise  unharmed.' " 
Then  another  suggestion  said:  "How  can  you  do  it,  you 
are  only  a  sinner?"  Here  we  see  very  nicely  the  marked 
activity  of  the  unconscious  and  the  part  played  by  the 
teleological  suggestions.  Both  Bleuler9  and  Jung10  give 
good  examples  of  this  mechanism.  It  is  a  quite  common 
contrast  automatism  and  generally  manifests  itself  in 
strong  dissociations.  Here  we  see  it  at  the  height  of  the 
disease. 

As  soon  as  he  left  the  hotel  the  suggestion  changed  into 
auditory  hallucinations.  It  was  impossible  to  find  out 
the  contents  of  the  hallucinations,  but  during  the  analysis 
of  Ass.  12  he  stated  that  the  voice  said  "water ,  drink 
water."     This  likelv  refers  to  the  Atlantic  (Ass.  7)  or  to 


166  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

his  complex  of  drinking  (see  Ass.  2).  We  know,  how- 
ever, that  the  voices  .so  terrified  him  as  to  cause  himto 
apply  for  police  protection. 

What  followed  he  remembers  but  dimly.  He  was  in  a 
delirious  dreamlike  state  for  about  a  week.  He  was  in 
heaven.  He  heard  indistinct  voices  and  saw  "many- 
bluish  angels."  His  father  was  God  and  he  was  Christ 
and  his  former  Superintendent  R.,  for  whom  he  had  no 
particular  love,  was  the  Holy  Ghost.  He  was  now 
reconciled  to  his  father  and  his  religion.  This  was  a 
hyperbolic  realization  of  the  normal  dream.  Says  Freud: 
"The  conscious  wish  becomes  a  dream  incitor  only  when 
it  succeeds  in  arousing  a  similar  unconscious  one,"  and 
"The  wish  as  represented  in  the  dream  must  be  an 
infantile  one."10  The  wish  realization  in  our  patient's 
delirium  certainly  fulfils  all  these  conditions.  It  sounds 
like  a  fragment  of  a  child's  conception  of  heaven  and 
recalls  such  religious  paintings  as  Hofmann's  Ascension 
or  Zuccaro's  Christ  Surrounded  by  Angels. 

Thus  the  problems  are  solved.  The  repressed  complexes 
now  dominate  the  ego-complex  and  influence  all  thoughts 
and  actions.  His  personality  underwent  a  complete 
transformation.  He  was  no  longer  a  follower  of  Stirner 
but  considered  the  "Ego  and  his  Own"  as  dangerous. 
From  the  avowed  philosopher  and  atheist  he  changed 
into  the  devout  believer  of  the  supernatural  and  hence  his 
preferred  quotation  "There  are  more  things  in  heaven  and 
earth,  doctor,  than  are  dreamt  of  in  your  psychiatry." 

Case.  II. — A.  St.,  twenty  years  old,  law  student  and  journalist, 
was  admitted  to  my  service  in  the  clinic  of  psychiatry,  Zurich,  on 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  167 

January  22,  1908.  His  friend  and  colleague  stated  that  the  patient 
was  a  Hungarian  journalist  who  came  to  Zurich  to  study  law.  He 
was  considered  very  diligent  and  brilliant,  but  somewhat  eccentric. 
He  seemed  to  have  been  depressed  for  some  time,  remaining  in  bed 
for  days  and  taking  very  little  nourishment,  but  for  the  previous 
two  days  he  had  shown  some  improvement.  He  attempted  to  shoot 
himself  at  about  12  o'clock  on  the  day  of  admission.  He  dis- 
charged five  shots  and  beyond  grazing  his  shirt,  striking  a  candle 
which  stood  near  his  bed  and  a  picture  of  Ibsen  on  the  opposite 
wall  he  did  no  damage.  The  reason  for  the  attempted  suicide  was 
supposed  to  be  unrequited  love.  In  the  beginning  of  December  he 
had  made  the  acquaintance  of  a  lady  student  with  whom  he  soon 
became  infatuated.  His  love  was  not  reciprocated  so  that  he  be- 
came despondent,  neglected  his  work  and  uttered  pessimistic  and 
gloomy  ideas.  The  informant  stated  that  as  soon  as  the  shots 
were  heard  he  ran  into  the  room  and  found  the  patient  lying  on  the 
bed  in  a  delirious  condition.  He  was  confused,  murmured  to  him- 
self and  asked  meaningless  questions,  repeating  "Where  are  the 
white  horses?"  The  last  question  he  also  repeatedly  put  to  the 
physician  who  was  called  in  soon  after  the  shooting. 

An  anamnesis  was  also  obtained  from  the  patient's  father  about  a 
week  later.  He  denied  any  psychic  abnormalities  in  the  family,  but 
he  himself  was  neuropathic  and  it  was  afterward  learned  that  one  of 
his  daughters  was  hysterical.  He  stated  that  the  patient  was  always 
somewhat  delicate,  but  developed  normally.  As  he  grew  up  he  was 
"indifferent,  cold,  seclusive  and  obdurate,  but  very  bright."  He 
was  always  at  the  head  of  his  class.  His  teachers  referred  to  him  as 
a  prodigy  and  his  professors  predicted  a  great  future  for  him.  At  a 
very  early  age  he  manifested  a  great  talent  for  writing  and  since 
his  fifteenth  year  he  had  supported  himself  by  journalism.  His 
feuilletons  were  sought  for  by  the  leading  Hungarian  journals.  Due 
to  the  divorce  of  his  parents  he  had  lived  apart  from  them  since  his 
fifteenth  year.  He,  however,  kept  on  corresponding  regularly  with 
his  father  and  paid  him  an  occasional  visit. 

On  admission  the  patient  was  exceedingly  apathetic  and  took 
absolutely  no  interest  in  his  surroundings.  When  addressed  he 
showed  some  confusion.  He  seemed  to  be  unable  to  comprehend  the 
questions  and  his  answers  were  monosyllabic  and  laconic.  He  did 
not  care  what  would  happen.     "Do  what  you  please,"  he  would  say. 


L68 


PSYCH  ANALYSIS 


In  appearance  he  was  under-developed  and  small.  His  head  seemed 
too  big  for  his  body,  probably  due  to  his  long,  black  hair  which  hung 
over  his  shoulders.  The  physical  examination  revealed  nothing  in 
particular.  In  the  ward  he  was  quiet  and  indifferent.  He  lay  on 
his  back  motionless,  either  keeping  his  eyes  shut  or  staring  vacantly 
into  space.  He  expressed  no  desires  and  when  an  attempt  was  made 
to  draw  him  into  conversation  he  became  mute.  He  took  very  little 
nourishment  and  this  only  after  much  urging.  When  seen  the  next 
morning  he  was  essentially  unchanged.  The  nurse  reported  that  he 
slept  well,  but  paid  absolutely  no  attention  to  anything. 

The  main  features  were  dulness,  apathy,  somnolence  and  probably 
hallucinations  as  shown  by  his  asking  for  white  horses.  This  condi- 
tion continued  for  four  days  after  which  he  gradually  became  brighter 
and  at  the  end  of  a  few  days  more  he  was  apparently  his  former  self. 

He  was  discharged  on  January  31  to  go  to  Vienna  with  his  father. 
Diagnosis,  schizophrenia.* 

We  have  here  a  precocious  youth,  slightly  burdened  by 
heredity,  who,  having  been  disappointed  in  love,  lost  his 
mental  equilibrium  and  merged  into  schizophrenia.  He 
made  an  unsuccessful  attempt  at  suicide  and  later  he 
was  delirious  and  hallucinatory,  uttering  senseless  stereo- 
typed phrases.  This  was  followed  by  a  short  period  of 
apathy,  mutism  and  dulness,  after  which  he  gradually 
improved. 

As  soon  as  conditions  were  favorable  an  attempt  was 
made  to  draw  the  patient  into  conversation  so  as  to  have 
him  explain  some  of  the  obscure  points,  but,  as  is  generally 
the  case,  nothing  of  importance  could  be  elicited.  He 
was  suspicious  or  simply  unwilling  to  enter  deeply  into 
the  questions.  A  hundred  associations  were  therefore 
taken  and  analyzed  by  the  psychanalytic  method,  i.e., 
after  the  complexes  were  found  I  resorted  to  the  contin- 

*  The  patient  has  been  perfectly  well  since  his  discharge  from  the 
hospital. 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES 


169 


uous  associations.  The  words  employed  were  the  usual 
100  words  used  for  psychanalytic  and  diagnostic  purposes. 
Some  of  the  words,  however,  were  changed  and  others 
bearing  directly  on  the  incident  were  inserted. 

The  following  are  some  of  the  associations  obtained 
from  the  patient: 


Stimulus  Word 

Reaction 

Time 

Reproduction 

4.  To  suppose 

Freedom 

3.8 

X 

5.  Pain 

Bad 

2.2 

X 

6.  Lazy 

Early 

1.8 

X 

7.  Moon 

Sun 

2.6 

X 

12.  To  frighten 

Epilepsy 

3.4 

X 

14.  Tired 

Rest 

2.0 

X 

15.  Intention 

Evil 

2.8 

X 

16.  To  dance 

Polish 

3.0 

X 

17.  Eye 

Eye 

3.8 

X 

19.  To  aim 

I 

3.8 

Candle 

Ass.  4    "to  sin 

mnsp — frpprlnrr 

)  "  rpfprs  tn 

his  p.nmnlpY  nf 

confinement.  He  supposes  that  he  will  soon  be  dis- 
charged from  the  hospital.  Ass.  5,  "pain — bad"  explains 
that  he  had  much  pain  over  this  love  affair,  but,  as  shown 
by  the  reaction  time,  it  provoked  no  emotion  whatever. 
Ass.  6,  "lazy — early"  refers  to  his  being  lazy.  He 
never  likes  to  rise  mornings.  It  also  recalls  that  he  was 
too  lazy  to  commit  suicide  in  the  morning  and  waited 
until  noon.  Ass.  7,  "moon — sun"  was  explained  as 
follows:  While  walking  one  day  with  Mina  (his  beloved), 
they  stopped  to  look  at  a  photograph  representing  a  man 
and  woman  riding  on  a  crescent  (moon).  At  that  time 
the  position  of  the  two  young  persons  on  the  crescent 
rather  pleased  him,  and  he  remarked  to  her  that  he  would 
like  to  ride  with  her  on  the  moon.     He  then  recalled  some 


170  PSYCHANALYSIS 

thin <rs  which  he  did  not  wish  to  explain — probably  some 
erotic  thoughts.  Ass.  12,  "to  frighten — epilepsy"  refer- 
red to  an  incident  in  the  ward.  An  epileptic  had  a  fit 
which  frightened  him  as  it  was  the  first  time  he  ever  saw 
such  thing.  Ass.  14,  "tired — rest"  referred  to  his  state 
before  admission  to  the  hospital.  Ass.  16,  "to  dance — 
Polish"  was  explained  as  follows:  "On  Saturday  evening, 
December  7, 1  went  to  the  Polish  dance  where  I  met  my 
three  lady  acquaintances,  Heda,  Mina  and  Dina.  My 
main  object  in  going  there  was  to  gather  some  material 
for  an  article  on  the  life  of  the  Russian  and  Polish  students 
in  Zurich."  He  stated  that  when  he  got  there  he  saw 
Miss  Dina,  whom  he  had  known  for  some  time,  in  the 
company  of  some  gentlemen.  He  was  not  indifferent  to 
her.  He  always  found  "something  pleasant  in  her." 
She  impressed  him  differently  from  the  others  because 
she  was  somewhat  outspoken.  On  a  number  of  occasions 
she  did  not  hesitate  to  tell  him  that  he  was  only  a  poseur, 
etc.,  a  thing  which  rather  wounded  his  vanity.  Yet, 
he  did  not  know  why,  she  continued  to  be  of  more  interest 
to  him  than  the  others.  For  some  reason  when  he  noticed 
her  at  the  dance  he  purposely  turned  to  another  direction, 
but  did  not  lose  sight  of  her.  On  that  evening  he  felt 
some  change  coming  over  him.  Of  a  usually  cynical 
and  taciturn  disposition  he  suddenly  became  very  cheerful 
and  loquacious.  The  music  exerted  an  unusual  influence 
on  him.  He  said  and  did  things  which  are  still  enigmatical 
to  him.  The  women  especially  pleased  him  and,  realizing 
this,  the  words  of  Mephistopheles  recurred  to  him:  "Du 
siehst  mit  diesem  Trank  im  Leibe,  Bald  Helenen  in  jedem 
Weibe."     Many  women  seemed  to  make  advances  to  him. 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  171 

They  sent  him  all  kinds  of  notes  and  made  nattering 
remarks   about   him.     One   elderly   woman   made   such 
remarks  as  "Just  see  this  handsome  boy,"  etc.     Another 
woman,  totally  unknown  to  him,  sent  him  a  senseless  note 
about  "loving,  human  and  erring."     Another  sent  him  a 
gillyflower.     On  later  losing  his  necktie  he  stuck  this 
flower  into  his  collar  and  wore  it  for  the  remainder  of  the 
evening.     Another  peculiar  action  was  this:  Everybody 
was  requested  to  wear  numbers  which  were  distributed 
to  everyone  present.     The  gentleman  and  lady  drawing 
the  same  numbers  were  supposed  to  exchange  souvenir 
cards.     When  he  received  his  number  he  scratched  it  out 
and  wrote  on  the  card  a  big  "I"  and  this  he  wore  the 
entire  evening.     He  further  recalled  that  he  was  very 
restless  for  a  few  days  previous.     He  spent  money  use- 
lessly, went  to  many  concerts,  felt  freer  than  usual,  and 
thought  of  traveling.     Ass.  17  "eye — eye"  refers  to  his 
own  eye.     He  thought  that  his  left  eye  was  somewhat 
smaller  than  his  right  and  this  he  considered  a  sign  of 
paresis.     This  gave  rise  to  a  number  of  hypochondriacal 
and  depressive  ideas.     In  a  letter  written  to  his  father 
long  before  this  suicide  episode  took  place  he  signed  him- 
self  "Candidate   for  Paresis."    Ass.    19,  "to   aim — I — 
candle"  he  explained  as  follows:  "At  the  moment  that 
I  grasped  the  revolver  I  felt  some  fear,  but  aimed  at  my 
breast.     The  discharge  confounded  me.     I  was  convinced 
that  I  had  struck  myself  and  dropped  the  revolver,  but 
I  immediately  grasped  it  again  and  fired  four  times.     I 
seemed  to  look  for  something  to  aim  at.     I  remember 
distinctly  aiming  at  the  candle  standing  not  far  from  the 


172 


PSYCIIANALY.SIS 


window  and  at  a  picture  of  a  bust  of  Ibsen  on  the  opposite 
wall."     More  of  this  later. 


Stimulus  Word 

Reaction 

Time 

Reproduction 

22.  Modest 

Violet 

3.2 

X 

23.  Ground 

Seed 

4.6 

Onanism 

27.  Death 

Accidentally 

3.0 

X 

30.  Bad 

Very 

3.2 

Night 

34.  Pretty 

Fairly 

2.0 

X 

40.  To  crack 

Arms 

2.0 

X 

47.  Weapon 

Unskilled 

3.6 

X 

48.  Forget 

Love 

3.0 

X 

51.  To  dare 

To  win 

3.8 

X 

Ass.  22,  "modest — violet"  was  explained  as  follows: 
"The  violet  is  a  symbol  of  modesty.  Miss  Dina  always 
repeated  that  I  was  not  modest.  Many  people  reproached 
me  for  the  same  thing,  but  I  always  sought  refuge  in 
Goethe  who  says  'only  scamps  are  modest.'"  Ass  23, 
"ground — seed — onanism."  By  way  of  explanation  he 
quoted  the  Bible  "He  (Onan)  spilled  it  on  the  ground 
lest  that  he  should  give  seed."  When  asked  whether  he 
masturbated  he  at  first  denied  it,  but  when  told  that  the 
associations  gave  distinct  evidence  of  it,  he  said:  "Well, 
since  you  know  it,  I  may  as  well  tell  you.  I  began  to 
masturbate  when  I  was  fourteen  and  continued  it  up  to 
about  a  year  ago.  I  then  knew  what  harm  it  did  me 
and  I  stopped  it."  When  asked  in  what  way  it  affected 
him  he  said  that  he  read  or  was  told  that  one  is  liable  to 
get  paresis  and  many  other  diseases  from  it.  Ass.  27, 
"death — accidentally"  referred  to  his  attempted  suicide. 
He  fitly  remarked  "I  could  have  died  through  accident." 
Ass.  30,  "bad — very — night"  referred  to  the  night  of 
January  15,  which  he  claimed  to  have  passed  very  rest- 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND   THE    PSYCHOSES  173 

lessly.  He  was  frequently  terrified  by  his  rocking  chair, 
the  coverings  on  which  made  him  think  of  the  dying 
Bajazzo.  On  the  12th,  Mina  and  the  others  went  to 
see  Bajazzo.  He  was  to  have  gone,  but  at  the  last  moment 
he  changed  his  mind  and  remained  at  home.  This  also 
recalled  a  conversation  with  Dina.  She  told  him  that 
his  mania  for  originality,  etc.,  was  simply  a  desire  to  pose. 
He  retorted  by  saying:  "but  don't  you  think  that  there  is 
something  tragic  even  in  the  poser,  in  the  comedy-playing 
Bajazzos.  If  they  really  perceive  the  real  feeling,  such 
apparent  comedies  may  sometimes  lead  to  tragedies." 
Ass.  34,  "pretty — fairly"  referred  to  Mina.  Ass.  40, 
"to  crack — arms"  means  the  revolver  with  which  he 
attempted  suicide.  This  recalled  his  friend,  R.,  concern- 
ing whom  he  had  read  that  he  had  attempted  suicide  by 
shooting  himself  in  the  head.  This  happened  some  time 
before  the  Polish  dance,  and  on  the  day  of  the  dance  he 
received  a  letter  from  his  friend  describing  the  attempted 
suicide  and  stating  that  it  had  concerned  a  woman,  and 
that  he  was  well.  Ass.  47,  "weapon — unskilled"  refers 
to  himself.  He  said  "  I  never  in  my  life  used  any  firearms 
and  when  I  made  up  my  mind  to  kill  myself  I  selected  a 
pretty  little  revolver."  Ass.  48,"  forget — love."  He  said: 
"I  am  trying  to  forget  my  love."  Ass.  51,  "to  dare — to 
win"  was  not  explained.  He  began  to  speak  about 
courage  and  daring  and  he  suddenly  stopped,  not  wishing 
to  continue. 


Stimulus 

Word 

Reaction 

Time 

Reproduction 

54.  Quick 

To  press 

2.4 

X 

55.  Child 

Big 

3.2 

X 

56.  Enjoy 

Life 

2.2 

X 

61.  Stone 

To  cast 

2.2 

X 

174 

PSYCIIANALYSIS 

Stimulus  Word 

R(  action 

Time 

Reproduction 

80.  To  understand 

Saying 

3.6 

X 

83.  Sofa 

To  sit 

2.8 

Girls 

87.  Snake 

Eve 

3.4 

X 

94.  To  write 

Feuilleton 

3.2 

Spirit 

95.  Horse 

Ghost 

3.0 

Rosmersholm 

Ass.  54,  "quick — to  press"  referred  to  his  suicide.  He 
was  frightened  when  he  grasped  the  revolver  so  that  he 
quickly  pulled  the  trigger.  Ass.  55,  "child — big."  Mina 
often  called  him  a  child,  which  greatly  offended  him  as 
he  considered  himself  a  man  "in  every  sense  of  the  word." 
Ass.  56,  "enjoy — life."  He  said  "I  was  tired  of  living 
and  wanted  to  die,  but  now  I  would  like  to  be  discharged 
so  as  to  enjoy  life.  Ass.  61,  "stone — to  cast"  recalled  the 
sentence:  "He  that  is  without  sin  among  you,  let  him 
cast  the  first  stone."  He  always  condemned  persons 
who  committed  suicide.  He  never  liked  a  play  or  a  book 
where  the  heroes  ended  their  lives.  He  thought  of  writing 
a  different  ending  to  Ibsen's  Rosmersholm.  Ass.  80,  "to 
understand — saying" — the  saying  is,  '"To  understand 
all  is  to  forgive  all ' — that  is  what  she  said  to  me  when  she 
rejected  my  proposal.  Her  friend  told  me  afterward  that 
she  was  abnormal  and  was  unable  to  love  any  man." 
Ass.  83,  "sofa — to  sit — girls"  referred  to  a  dream  which  he 
had  while  in  the  hospital  in  which  the  three  girls  were 
sitting  on  a  sofa,  etc.  Ass.  87,  "snake — Eve."  "A 
snake  was  the  cause  of  Eve's  fall,"  he  said.  "A  cat  and 
a  snake  are  symbols  of  falsehood."  Snake  made  him 
think  of  penis.  Ass.  94,  "to  write — feuilleton — spirit" 
he  explained  thus:  "When  I  decided  to  commit  suicide 
I  immediately  thought  of  writing  a  number  of  articles, 
one  a  dialogue,  a  witty  interview  between  A.  St.,  the 


P3YCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  175 

collaborator  of  the  Pesti  Naplo  and  his  spirit.  I  also 
intended  to  write  to  Dina  that  just  at  Tshepurnoy  (the 
reference  is  to  Gorky's  'Children  of  the  Sun')  saved  the 
honor  of  the  veterinary  surgeons  by  committing  suicide, 
I  saved  the  honor  of  the  'posers.'"  Ass.  95,  "horse — 
ghost — Rosmersholm"  referred  to  the  white  horses  which 
play  such  a  part  in  Ibsen's  Rosmersholm. 

A  brief  examination  of  these  associations  shows  that 
most  of  them  belong  to  the  erotic  complexes.  We  are 
also  struck  by  the  slight  emotivity  manifested  in  the 
associations  directly  concerned  with  the  love  episode. 
This  is  especially  striking  when  all  the  100  associations 
are  examined.  Indeed,  whereas  the  associations  evoked 
very  interesting  and  valuable  points  they  gave  us  very 
little  information  about  the  principal  episode,  the  supposed 
cause  of  this  whole  drama.  The  widest  emotional 
excursions  were  connected  with  the  complexes  extraneous 
to  this  episode.  From  the  twenty-nine  associations  given, 
twelve  (7,  16,  19,  27,  34,  40,  47,  48.  54,  56,  80  and  83) 
bear  directly  on  the  drama,  and  on  examination  we  find 
that  the  arithmetical  average  of  the  reaction  time  is 
2.8  seconds,  a  very  minimal  increase  over  the  normal,  and, 
furthermore,  there  is  only  one  failure  of  reproduction 
and  that  in  association  19.  This  last,  however,  does  not 
sensu  stricto,  belong  to  the  episode,  as  we  shall  see  later, 
so  that  the  average  is  still  more  reduced.  Translating 
this  into  association  language,  we  say  that  the  so-called 
complex-indicators  are  entirely  absent  where  you  would 
most  expect  them.  Indeed,  when  I  reviewed  the  100 
associations  originally  taken  I  found  that  the  twenty-nine 
selected  are  the  only  associations  that  in  any  way  concern 


176  PSTCHANALTSia 

i\\o  case,  the  other  seventy-one  belonging  to  entirely 
different  complexes.  This  simply  indicates  that  there 
are,  perhaps,  other  more  forceful  factors  than  the  mere 
love  affair,  that  some  invisible  psychic  undercurrent  may 
play  a  greater  part  than  the  supposed  cause — love. 

If  we  orient  ourselves  on  the  incidents  appertaining  to 
this  love  affair  we  find  that  long  before  the  patient  became 
infatuated  with  Mina  he  was  acquainted  with  Dina.  In 
his  kat  amnestic  account  the  patient  says:  "  I  was  attracted 
to  her — Dina — by  more  than  mere  sympathy.  She 
was  outspoken  and  called  me  a  poseur,  but  I  always  liked 
to  be  in  her  company."  Some  time  after  he  met  Mina 
and  Heda,  who  did  not  make  any  particular  impression  on 
him  and  it  was  not  until  the  Polish  dance  that  he  really 
became  acquainted  with  them.  The  first  part  of  the 
evening  he  had  no  predilection,  but  as  the  night  advanced 
Mina  attracted  him  more  than  her  friend.  On  going 
home  the  next  morning  he  walked  with  Mina  and  he  still 
was  in  the  "Hellenic  state,"  very  cheerful  and  frolicsome, 
but  nothing  was  said  of  love.  There  were,  however,  some 
allusions  to  "waltzing  through  life  together,"  but  that 
was  said  jocosely  and  in  company.  The  "Hellenic  state" 
he  described  as  follows:  "It  seemed  to  me  that  I  had  no 
ponderance.  I  felt  infinitely  light,  ethereal  and  contrary 
to  my  wonted  cynicism  I  then  felt  infinitely  good,  well 
wishing  to  everything  and  everybody.  I  felt  neither  de- 
sire nor  wishes.  It  was  a  drop  of  the  blessed  sea  of  eternal 
contentment."  This  apathetic  euphoria  continued  until 
Sunday  afternoon,  when  he  again  met  the  ladies  in  the 
company  of  a  gentleman.  For  some  reason  he  immediately 
took  a  dislike  to  this  man  and  his  euphoria  disappeared. 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  177 

On  returning  to  his  room  he  felt  "confused  and  could 
not  account  for  my  actions  of  last  night  and  today." 
He  tried  to  repose  for  a  few  hours,  as  he  had  an  appoint- 
ment with  his  friend  to  take  the  girls  to  the  theater  in  the 
evening,  but  he  was  exceedingly  restless  and  unable  to 
remain  in  the  room.  That  evening  he  went  to  the  theater, 
but  did  not  enjoy  himself  at  all.  The  following  days 
continued  uneventful.  He  frequently  saw  Mina  and 
her  friend  in  the  boarding  house,  but  had  no  serious 
thoughts.  On  the  contrary  he  recalled  that  on  one 
occasion  the  thought  of  love  came  to  him  and  he  immedi- 
ately suppressed  it,  saying  to  himself  "Do  not  delude 
yourself.  Be  careful  lest  you  lose  your  liberty.  It 
would  be  like  committing  suicide."  It  was  not  until  a 
few  days  before  she  was  to  leave  Zurich  for  her  Christmas 
vacation  that  he  was  cognizant  of  the  fact  that  he  was  in 
love.  He,  however,  doubted  it.  She  left  on  the  20th 
and  it  was  then  that  it  became  clear  to  him  that  he  loved 
her.  He  was  distracted,  indifferent  to  everything  and 
suddenly  conceived  the  idea  of  taking  to  his  bed.  Before 
doing  so  he  wrote  her  a  letter  in  which  he  told  her  all  and 
asked  for  a  categoric  answer.  He  remained  in  bed  for 
three  days  in  succession,  during  which  time  he  ate  but 
little  and  slept  less.  He  was  sure  that  she  would  reject 
his  proposal,  wept  much  and  was  obsessed  by  anxious 
thoughts.  He  then  got  up  and  immediately  visited  Dina. 
She  again  accused  him  of  being  a  poseur  and  he  said, 
"I  am  really  a  thorough  poseur,  I  can  delude  even  myself. 
I  could  commit  most  terrible  acts,  such  as  marrying  or 
committing  suicide."  Following  this  visit  he  felt  better. 
Mina's  answer  was  rather  equivocal.     She  "did  not  know 

12 


178  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

what  to  say,"  etc.  She  returned  on  January  4,  and 
"strange  to  Bay,  when  I  saw  her  not  only  was  I  not 
surprised,  but  I  even  seemed  to  be  indifferent."  He 
continued  to  see  her  regularly,  but  they  never  broached 
the  subject.  From  the  10th  he  was  very  excited  and 
had  some  fever  and  spent  most  of  the  time  in  bed.  "On 
the  14th  Mina  visited  me  and  during  our  conversa- 
tion she  told  me  that  she  did  not  think  she  could  be 
capable  of  loving  any  one.  She  left  me  at  11  p.m.  The 
rest  of  the  night  I  slept  fairly  well,  but  dreamed  of  Dina." 
The  following  days  he  was  very  depressed  and  rest- 
less, took  no  interest  in  anything,  ate  and  slept  very 
little.  On  the  17th,  while  walking  about  aimlessly,  he 
suddenly  decided  to  commit  suicide  and  at  the  same  time 
he  was  speculating  on  the  interesting  and  original  letters 
that  he  would  write  before  shooting  himself.  He  did  not 
know  what  he  would  write  to  Mina,  but  thought  of  writing 
to  Dina,  and  also  a  dialogue,  an  interview  between  himself 
and  his  spirit.  He  decided  to  buy  a  revolver.  "The 
money  that  I  expected  did  not  come,"  said  he.  "I  then 
went  to  see  Dina.  I  wanted  to  hear  her  repeat  that  I  was 
nothing  but  a  poseur,  but  she  was  not  at  home."  A  few 
hours  later  he  again  tried  to  visit  her,  but  she  was 
not  at  home.  The  following  day — the  18th — he  again 
called  on  her  and  again  missed  her.  Sunday  he  passed 
restlessly,  but  was  watched  by  a  colleague  who  suspected 
him.  On  Monday,  just  about  noon  time  he  made  the 
attempt.  He  waited  until  he  saw  Mina  and  Heda  go  into 
the  dining  room  and  then  ran  into  his  room,  undressed, 
and  went  to  bed.  He  did  not  lock  the  door  and  then 
attempted  suicide  as  described  above. 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  179 

Analysis. — Strange  as  it  may  seem  the  psychanalysis 
shows  that  the  love  affair  played  a  very  little,  if  any  part, 
in  this  whole  syndrome.  No  matter  how  a  person  may  try 
to  conceal  things  he  cannot  hide  his  emotions  and  uncon- 
scious actions.  The  associations,  like  dreams,  never  lie. 
The  complex  indicators  never  fail  to  show  the  complex, 
that  is,  the  emotionally  accentuated  presentations  which 
are  usually  split  off  from  consciousness  and  repressed  in 
the  unconscious.  On  superficial  examination  it  may  seem 
that  the  psychosis  was  caused  by  the  love  affair,  but  as 
soon  as  we  enter  more  deeply  into  the  question  we  are 
struck  with  the  marked  disproportion  between  the  exciting 
cause  and  the  reaction  and  we  ask  ourselves  why  should 
an  insignificant  love  episode  produce  a  psychosis  in  a 
young  man  who  has  made  his  way  in  the  world  since  his 
fifteenth  year  as  a  student  and  journalist  and  who,  from 
his  own  account,  has  had  similar  experiences  before  this? 
To  be  sure  there  are  those  who  maintain  that  just  this 
incongruity  between  noopsyche  and  thymopsyche  is 
characteristic  of  dementia  prsecox,  but  one  of  the  greatest 
achievements  of  psychanalysis  is  the  fact  that  it  conclu- 
sively shows  that  in  neither  the  psychoneuroses  nor  the 
psychoses  proper  is  there  such  a  thing  as  incongruity 
between  noopsyche  and  thymopsyche.  Wherever  a 
thorough  examination  is  possible  it  is  always  found  that 
the  reaction  is  quite  adequate  and  that  it  simply  appears 
incongruous  to  us  because  we  cannot  or  do  not  enter  into 
the  patient's  psyche.  Moreover,  when  we  examine  our 
patient's  past  we  find  that  long  before  this  last  experience 
he  was  depressed  and  listless,  remaining  in  bed  for  days  at 
a  time  and  that  he  evinced  many  peculiar  actions.     All 


180  PSYCHANALYSIS 

this  distinctly  shows  that  the  love  episode  was  only  one  of 
many  contributing  exciting  factors. 

On  reviewing  the  100  associations  we  find  that  they 
refer  to  four  principal  complexes,  namely,  love,  vanity, 
death  and  masturbation.  Of  these  thirty-five  belong  to 
the  death  complex,  twenty  to  the  complex  of  masturba- 
tion, twelve  to  the  vanity  complex,  and  twelve  to  the  love 
episode.  In  other  words,  death  and  masturbation  are 
of  paramount  importance  while  the  love  episode  plays 
only  a  subordinate  part. 

The  love  complex  we  have  already  discussed,  and  of  his 
vanity  both  he  himself  and  his  father  stated  that  he  was 
always  very  vain  and  of  an  independent  nature.  He 
stated  "I  am  not  of  an  emotional  nature.  My  parents 
reproached  me  for  being  heartless,  vain  and  cold,  saying 
that  my  blood  was  as  cold  as  that  of  an  Englishman  and 
that  I  was  too  independent."  The  wounding  of  his  vanity 
was  always  associated  with  his  suicide.  In  his  katamnestic 
account  he  stated:  "  I  was  suddenly  struck  with  the  idea  of 
committing  suicide  and  I  immediately  tried  to  find  Dina 
so  as  to  evoke  from  her  the  oft-repeated  statement  that  I 
was  a  'thorough  irremediable  poseur.'"  He  was  also 
chagrined  by  Mina  because  she  called  him  "child."  He 
insisted  that  he  was  a  man  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  word. 

Psychanalysis  of  the  complexes  of  death  showed  that 
for  some  inexplicable  reason  the  patient  had  for  some  time 
both  consciously  and  unconsciously,  occupied  himself 
with  the  problem  of  death.  When  asked  to  associate 
freely  to  the  word  "  death"  he  gave  the  following  reactions: 
"When  we  dead  awaken" — he  recalled  his  friend  the 
actor,  who  was  supposed  to  have  blown  out  his  brains — 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  181 

Rosmersholm.  On  further  analysis  we  found  that  "when 
we  dead  awaken"  refers  to  Ibsen's  drama  of  that  title 
He  stated  that  for  some  time  this  play  strongly  appealed 
to  him,  but  since  reading  Rosmersholm  the  latter  had 
exerted  a  greater  influence  over  him.  He,  however,  did 
not  like  the  last  act,  and  thought  seriously  of  rewriting  the 
play,  giving  it  another  ending.  He  despised  persons  like 
Rosmer  and  Rebecca  for  committing  suicide.  "  They  are 
not  people  of  this  world,"  he  said,  "they  belong  to  the 
morbid,  fanatic  and  romantic  nations."  While  in  the 
hospital  he  wrote  to  the  author:  "Do  I  perhaps  suffer 
from  neurasthenia  or  am  I  in  the  first  stage  of  paresis? 
If  so  I  will  see  that  it  will  not  progress."  In  a  letter  which 
he  sent  to  his  father  long  before  this  love  episode  occurred 
he  signed  himself  "  Candidate  for  Paresis."  Moreover,  for 
the  previous  year  or  so  he  signed  his  feuilletons  with  the 
following  pseudonyms  "Schakal,"  "Sansdieu,"  "Enfant 
Terrible"  and  "Sansculotte."  Those  who  are  unfamiliar 
with  Freud's  "Psychopathology  of  Every  Day  Life"11  may 
consider  our  patient's  use  of  the  pseudonyms  as  purely 
accidental,  but  we  have  it  from  Freud  that  nothing  is 
adventitious  or  arbitrary.  Just  such  trivialities  show  us 
the  real  unconscious  activity.  These  pseudonyms  are 
the  equivalent  for  "I  am  a  jackal,  godless,"  etc.  That 
is  to  say,  they  represent  delusions  of  self-accusation. 

All  that  clearly  shows  that  long  before  the  love  episode 
the  patient  was  hypochondriacal  and  restless.  He 
entertained  a  number  of  delusions  of  a  depressive,  soma- 
topsychic and  self-accusatory  nature.  He  made  a  num- 
ber of  unsuccessful  attempts  to  stop  masturbating,  for 
he  thought  that  it  would  produce  paresis,  and  when  he 


182  I'SYCHANALYSIS 

finally  noticed  a  slight  difference  in  the  size  of  his  eyes 
he  became  firmly  convinced  that  he  was  a  paretic.  He 
also  heard  and  read  much  about  paresis  and,  as  we  have 
shown,  he  soon  began  to  occupy  himself  with  the  problem  of 
death.  Therefore,  anything  referring  to  it  interested 
him.  It  was  while  in  that  state  of  mind  that  he  fell  in 
love  with  Mina  and  for  a  brief  period  there  was  a  reaction, 
the  "Hellenic  state."  This,  however,  soon  disappeared 
and  long  before  he  knew  that  his  love  would  not  be 
reciprocated  he  again  became  depressed.  This  love 
episode  was  simply  the  "last  straw  to  break  the  camel's 
back."  That  is,  the  conflict  probably  existed  for  years 
until  finally  a  compromise  formation  took  place  and  the 
result  was  the  suicidal  episode. 

The  situation,  in  brief,  was  as  follows:  "I  am  suffering 
from  an  incurable  disease — paresis — which  I  brought 
upon  myself  by  masturbation  and  as  I  will  become  insane 
I  had  better  commit  suicide."  Added  to  that  there  was 
the  wounding  of  his  vanity  by  both  Dina  and  Mina. 
Against  all  this,  however,  there  was  the  inherent  desire 
to  live.  In  the  language  of  Jung,  the  long-existing  con- 
flict in  a  personal  predisposition  finally  produced  a  split- 
ting of  consciousness,  or  Janet's  abaissement  du  niveau 
mental,  thus  allowing  the  repressed  complexes  to  rid  them- 
selves of  the  domination  of  the  ego  complex  and  manifest 
themselves  in  the  different  automatisms  of  the  syndrom.12 

Let  us  now  examine  the  psychic  constellations  of  the 
individual  symptoms.  In  the  first  place,  we  may  ask 
why  the  patient  chose  this  method  of  suicide?  This  was 
directly  suggested  to  him  by  the  shooting  episode  in  the 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  183 

life  of  his  friend,  the  actor.  He,  himself,  had  never  before 
handled  any  firearm  and  there  was  absolutely  no  reason 
why  he  should  have  deferred  this  affair  as  he  did  for  the 
purpose  of  getting  money  to  buy  a  revolver.  He  had 
numerous  other  means  within  his  reach.  He  could  at 
any  time  have  resorted  to  hanging,  drowning  or  poisoning, 
which  would  have  been  easier  to  accomplish.  Still  he 
selected  a  method  which  was  entirely  foreign  to  him. 
When  he  bought  the  revolver  he  had  to  ask  the  storekeeper 
for  instructions  as  to  its  use.  I  have  it  from  Dr.  M.  S. 
Gregory,  who  has  devoted  considerable  time  to  the 
subject,  that  suicides  invariably  follow  a  definite  proce- 
dure. Thus  soldiers  and  others  who  are  accustomed  to 
firearms  always  select  pistols  or  revolvers  for  suicidal 
purposes;  physicians,  druggists  and  chemists  invariably 
use  poison,  while  ordinary  persons  follow  some  method 
suggested  by  suicidal  incidents  read  in  the  daily  press  or 
they  imitate  some  relative  or  friend.  The  same  day  that 
he  attended  the  Polish  dance  he  received  a  letter  from 
his  friend,  telling  him  that  he  was  alive  and  well,  though 
he  had  attempted  to  blow  out  his  brains  on  account  of  a 
woman. 

According  to  Freud  all  delusional  formations  and  actions 
are  the  result  of  a  compromise.  There  are  two  psychic 
streams  opposing  each  other  and  finally  each  yields  a  part 
of  its  demand  and  a  mutual  accommodation  results.  Our 
patient's  suicidal  attempt  was  simply  symbolic.  He 
really  did  not  wish  to  terminate  his  life,  though  he  wished 
to  die.  He  simply  wished  to  annihilate  that  part  of  him- 
self which  was  most  repugnant  to  him  and  which  was 
responsible  for  his  malady. 


184  PSYCHANALYSIS 

Association  10  shows  that  the  patient  aimed  directly  at 
the  candle.  On  being  asked  to  associate  to  candle  he 
gave  the  following:  "It  recalls  to  me  a  picture  of  a  big 
candle,  a  big  white  candle  on  a  dark  background.  Candles 
always  make  me  feel  disagreeable.  I  used  to  avoid  passing 
a  certain  store  where  there  was  a  show  case  filled  with 
candles.  The  burning  candles  with  the  dripping  tallow 
which  I  used  to  see  in  churches  and  temples  nauseated  me. 
That  recalled  a  girl  named  'Baby  S.'  whom  I  used  to 
know — that's  all."  When  asked  about  this  girl  he  showed 
numerous  blockings  and  then  continued:  " She  was  anaemic 
and  they  used  to  say  that — that  she  candled  herself." 
Again  blockings,  but  after  considerable  urging  he  stated 
that  a  candle  with  the  dripping  tallow  recalls  the  penis 
after  masturbation,  a  thing  which  always  filled  him  with 
disgust.  The  resistance  was  broken  and  he  frankly  added : 
"That  has  been  the  bane  of  my  life.  I  have  not  done 
it  for  a  year  because  I  was  told  that  it  would  cause 
paresis." 

The  candle,  as  we  see,  is  simply  a  symbolic  representa- 
tion of  the  penis.  This  is  a  familiar  and  widespread  sym- 
bol, both  in  this  country  and  abroad.  The  general 
popular  belief  that  a  virgin  can  relight  with  her  breath  a 
candle  recently  extinguished  probably  owes  its  origin  to 
the  same  symbolic  expression13  (relight  with  her  breath 
a  candle — reawraken  lost  sexual  powers). 

Thus  we  see  the  reason  for  his  aiming  at  the  candle.  In 
destroying  the  candle  he  killed  that  part  of  himself  which 
is  at  the  basis  of  all  his  trouble. 

Why  did  he  aim  at  Ibsen's  picture?  In  order  to  under- 
stand this  it  is  necessary  to  cite  a  fragment  of  a  long  dream 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  185 

which  the  patient  had  while  in  the  hospital.  It  was  as 
follows:  "I  got  a  harp  and  played  something  melancholic 
and  the  doctor  stood  there  watching  me  and  then  ex- 
claimed, 'Behold  a  lion's  head  arising  on  a  feeble  body/ 
and  then  wishing  to  hide  his  feelings  he  turned  away." 
According  to  Freud,  whenever  one  hears  some  speech  in  the 
dream  it  generally  signifies  that  the  dreamer  has  heard  at 
some  time  the  exact  or  similar  words.  The  words  which 
he  puts  in  the  doctor's  mouth  he  actually  heard  from  the 
doctor.  On  seeing  the  patient  for  the  first  time,  while  he 
was  still  in  the  somnolent  state,  I  was  struck  by  the  size 
of  his  head  and  I  remarked  to  the  supervisor  "He  looks 
ill  and  is  underdeveloped.  His  head  seems  too  big  for  his 
body."  In  the  dream  this  is  changed  to  a  lion's  head. 
On  analyzing  the  expression  "lion's  head"  we  obtained 
the  following:  "Head  of  a  lion — Max  Lieberman,  a 
German  painter,  made  a  picture  of  a  sphinx  with  the  head 
of  Ibsen  on  it — it  looks  like  a  lion's  head — thinks  of  his 
own  head  which  he  believes  "perhaps  resembles  Ibsen's 
head."  On  further  analysis  he  identified  himself  directly 
with  the  great  poet  and  stated  that  he  noticed  the  resem- 
blance between  himself  and  Ibsen  and  that  is  why  he  bought 
the  picture.  We  can  now  understand  why  he  shot  at  the 
picture,  for  in  doing  so  he  again  symbolically  shot  himself. 
We  also  know  that  for  more  than  a  year  he  took  great 
interest  in  Ibsen's  works,  especially  "When  We  Dead 
Awaken"  and  "Rosmersholm."  This,  too,  as  mentioned 
above,  is  a  symbolic  action.  The  title  of  the  former  play 
appealed  to  him  because,  believing  that  he  was  suffering 
from  an  incurable  disease  and  that  he  would  soon  die,  he 
naturally   speculated   on    "When   We   Dead   Awaken." 


186  PSY<   II  ANALYSIS 

Such  symbolic  actions  are  frequently  observed  in  every- 
day life.  Only  within  a  few  days  the  daily  press  reported 
the  case  of  a  New  York  embezzler  who  was  discovered  by 
detectives  in  a  Philadelphia  public  library.  The  book 
which  he  was  reading  at  the  time  of  his  arrest  was  entitled 
"Will  I  Ever  Go  Back?"  Rosmersholm,  too,  appealed  to 
him  because  he  directly  identified  himself  with  Rosmer 
"the  happy  nobleman  who  goes  to  death,"  but  as  the 
"will  to  live"  always  predominated  in  him  he  at  first  dis- 
liked the  suicide  of  the  lovers  and  even  thought  of  re- 
writing the  last  act. 

What  was  the  origin  of  the  stereotype  "  Where  are  the 
white  horses?"  Those  who  have  read  Ibsen's  drama  will 
recall  that  whenever  a  death  occurred  in  Rosmersholm. 
the  white  horse  was  sure  to  make  its  appearance.  As  our 
patient  identified  himself  with  Rosmer  and  lived  through 
the  tragic  end  of  the  "happy  nobleman"  he  looked  for 
the  white  horse  in  his  delirium  and  hence  the  stereotyped 
question,  "Where  are  the  white  horses?" 

Thus  we  see  that  there  was  nothing  mysterious  or  sense- 
less in  our  patient's  actions.  All  these  actions  and  utter- 
ances had  a  reason  and  followed  the  same  course  as  that 
of  any  normal  individual.  Indeed,  those  who  make  use 
of  the  psychanalytic  method  are  well  aware  of  the  fact 
that  whenever  the  patient's  mind  can  be  entered  he  ceases 
to  be  an  enigma  and  his  "  senseless  actions  and  utterances  " 
cease  to  appear  senseless.  On  the  contrary  we  are  often 
struck  with  the  purposeful,  nay  ingenious,  construction  of 
the  whole  scheme.  Moreover,  we  are  always  sure  to  miss 
— that  "  garbage  can"  of  mental  diseases — the  "  dementia" 
which  is  supposed  to  be  the  main  characteristic  of  the  dis- 


PSYCHANALYSIS    AND    THE    PSYCHOSES  187 

ease.  I  have  not  seen  a  single  analyzable  case  of  dementia 
praecox  that  showed  any  dementia.  Those  cases  whose 
minds  we  cannot  penetrate  merely  because  the  patients 
refuse  to  cooperate  with  us  we  are  hardly  justified  in 
calling  "demented."  Every  careful  observer  will  recall 
that  now  and  then  a  "dement,"  who  has  been  noted  for 
years  with  the  familiar  formula  "  No  change,  dull,  stupid, 
and  demented,"  suddenly  loses  his  dementia  and  acts  in  a 
perfectly  rational  manner.  I  can  now  recall  three  cases 
of  dementia  prsecox  that  I  observed  in  the  Central  Islip 
State  Hospital  which  were  "demented"  two,  three  and 
five  years,  respectively,  and  then  fully  recovered,  which 
led  me  to  believe  in  the  truth  of  the  statement  that  demen- 
tia prsecox  is  often  "neither  a  dementia  nor  a  prsecox." 
The  works  of  the  Zurich  school  and  of  other  investigators 
have  amply  demonstrated  these  facts  and  it  is  for  these 
reasons  that  my  former  chief,  Prof.  Bleuler,  to  whom  I 
am  indebted  for  these  cases,  repudiates  this  meaningless 
term,  dementia  praecox,  and  uses  Schizophrenia.14 

References 

1.  Diagnostiche  Assoziations  Studien,  Vol.  I,  Barth,  Leipzig,  1906. 

2.  Translated  by  A.  A.   Brill,  American  Journal  of  Psychology, 
April,  1910. 

3.  Freud:  Selected  Papers  on  Hysteria,  p.  194. 

4.  Janet:  Les  Obsessions  et  la  Psychasthenic,  Paris,  1903. 

5.  The  Psychology  of  Dementia  Prsecox.     Translated  by  Peterson 
and  Brill. 

6.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  165. 

7.  Jung:  L.  c. 

8.  Cf.  Chap.  III. 

9.  Bewusstsein   u.    Assoziation,    Diagnost.   Assoziations   Studien, 
Beitrag  V.  and  Jung,  L.  c. 


1SS 


I'MVHANALYSIS 


10.  The   Interpretation   of   Dream,    Translated    by   A.    A.    Brill, 
George  Allen,  London,  and  The  Marmillan  Co.,  New  York. 

11.  Cf.  Chap.  VIII. 

12.  Jung:  L.  c. 

13.  Liebman:  Christ  lichen  Symbolic,  p.  76,  Leipzig,  Reklam  Ed. 

14.  Bleuler:  Schizophrenic,  Deuticke,  Wien,  1911. 


CHAPTER  VII 

PSYCHOLOGICAL  MECHANISMS  OF  PARANOIA 

Its  Relation  to  Homosexual  Wish-phantasies 

The  subject  of  paranoia  has  always  been  a  puzzle  for 
psychiatrists  and  much  has  been  said  and  written  about  it, 
but  as  far  as  my  knowledge  of  the  literature  goes  no  real 
attempt  or  progress  has  been  made  toward  its  solution. 
It  is  not  my  purpose  to  enter  here  into  an  extensive  dis- 
cussion on  the  subject  of  paranoia  in  general,  but  merely 
to  throw  light  on  some  of  the  psychological  elements  of  the 
subject.    I  will  cite  the  following  case: 

E.  R.,  thirty-six  years  old,  married,  school  teacher  by  occupation, 
was  admitted  to  my  service  at  the  Central  Islip  State  Hospital,  August 
31,  1906.  He  came  by  transfer  from  the  Bloomingdale  Hospital 
where  he  had  been  for  some  time.  In  brief  the  history  of  the  case 
taken  from  commitment  papers  was  as  follows:  In  infancy  the 
patient  sustained  a  severe  fall  on  the  head,  but  without  apparent 
injury.  In  childhood  he  was  subject  to  violent  fits  of  temper.  He 
would  strike  his  head  against  the  wall  when  angry  and  is  supposed  to 
have  had  some  fainting  attacks  when  frightened.  At  an  early  age 
he  was  employed  in  a  factory.  He  resented  his  vulgar  surroundings 
and  blamed  his  relatives  for  permitting  him  to  work  there.  He 
entered  college  at  sixteen  and  worked  his  way  through.  He  stood 
well  in  his  classes,  but  was  not  popular  with  his  classmates.  He 
often  quarreled  with  them  and  assumed  a  high  moral  plane.  He 
refused  to  accompany  them  on  frolics  because  he  would  not  visit 
common  places.  He  graduated  in  1898  and  then  took  up  school 
teaching.  Here,  too,  he  did  not  seem  to  get  along  well  with  his  prin- 
cipal and  the  other  teachers.     He  was  disappointed  at  not  being 

189 


190  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

promoted  to  teach  a  higher  grade  and  suspected  that  there  was  a 
conspiracy  against  him.  He  imagined  that  the  principal  and  other 
teachers  were  trying  to  work  up  a  "badger  game"  on  him  to  the 
effect  that  he  had  had  some  immoral  relations  with  his  girl  pupils. 
As  a  result  of  these  delusions  he  would  not  permit  his  girl  pupils  to 
come  near  him  in  the  school  room.  In  1903  he  married,  after  a 
hasty  courtship,  and  soon  thereafter  he  took  a  strong  dislike  to  his 
brother-in-law  and  sister  and  accused  them  of  immorality.  He  also 
accused  his  wife  of  illicit  relations  with  his  brother  and  his  brother-in- 
law,  Mr.  S.  These  erotic  delusions,  in  conjunction  with  many  other 
delusions  of  self-reference  and  persecution,  became  very  active.  The 
patient  threatened  to  shoot  his  imaginary  persecutors,  so  that  it 
became  necessary  to  commit  him  to  Bloomingdale  Hospital.  There 
he  remained  from  March,  1906,  to  June,  1906,  when  he  was  taken 
home  on  a  trial  visit,  but  as  he  soon  began  to  react  to  his  delusions 
and  became  excited  and  threatening,  he  was  returned  to  the  hospital 
after  two  days.  One  of  his  peculiar  delusions  at  that  time  was  that 
Dr.  D.,  the  physician  in  charge,  was  his  wife  in  disguise. 

When  he  was  brought  to  the  Central  Islip  State  Hospital  he  was 
quite  calm  and  natural  in  his  conversation.  As  we  had  been  class- 
mates at  college  we  were  both  pleased  and  sorry  to  meet  under  the 
circumstances.  He  spoke  freely  about  his  condition,  but  he  denied, 
or  tried  to  explain  away  his  many  delusions.  Without  entering  into 
the  details  of  his  behavior  during  the  four  months  he  was  under 
my  care,  I  will  merely  state  that  he  presented  a  typical  case  of  paran- 
oia. Mr.  S.,  his  brother-in-law,  was  the  arch  conspirator  against  him. 
He  accused  him  of  immoral  relations  with  his  wife  and  his  mother 
and  Mrs.  S.,  i.e.,  patient's  sister.  He  often  imagined  that  I  was  his 
wife  in  disguise  and  on  a  number  of  occasions  he  also  accused  his 
brother  of  being  his  wife  in  disguise.  The  following  notes  taken  from 
the  patient's  history  nicely  illustrate  that  point:  "On  Sept.  6,  1906, 
while  speaking  to  me,  he  said:  'Suppose  I  should  tell  you  that  my 
brother  who  visited  me  last  Saturday  and  Doctor  Brill  were  both 

Mrs.    R.    (wife)   in  disguise Doctor  may  I  ask  you  a 

frank  question?'  When  told  to  do  so  he  said,  'Did  you  really  have 
an  interview  with  me  last  Sunday  or  is  it  only  another  case  of  Doctor 
Jekyl  and  Mr.  Hyde?  You  don't  look  to-day  as  you  looked  then. 
You  had  all  the  feminine  traits  of  Mrs.  R. ;  to-day  you  are  severe  and 
look  like  yourself.'" 


PSYCHOLOGICAL    MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  191 

He  also  imagined  that  some  women  made  signs  to  him  and  were  in 
the  hospital  for  the  purpose  of  liberating  him .  Whenever  he  heard 
anybody  talking  he  immediately  referred  it  to  himself.  He  inter- 
preted every  movement  and  expression  as  having  some  special  mean- 
ing for  himself.  There  was  no  impairment  of  his  orientation  or 
reasoning  power.  Contrary  to  the  advice  of  the  physicians  he  was 
discharged  December  11,  1906. 

It  will  hardly  be  worth  while  to  enter  into  the  further 
particulars  of  the  symptomatology  of  this  case.  I  will 
simply  relate  the  following  facts:  In  the  summer  of  1908 
the  patient  was  returned  to  Bellevue  Hospital  by  his  own 
family  because  he  was  very  delusional  and  because  they 
considered  him  dangerous.  After  having  been  there  over 
three  months  and  after  a  long  trial  before  a  jury  in  the 
Supreme  court  where  five  physicians,  including  myself, 
had  testified  that  he  was  a  dangerous  paranoiac,  he  was 
declared  sane  and  congratulated  by  the  Supreme  Court 
justice  and  the  jury  on  his  able  management  of  his  own 
case.  He  did  not  wait  for  his  official  discharge  from  the 
psychopathic  ward  of  Bellevue  Hospital,  but  escaped  to 
Canada.  His  psychosis  was  apparently  progressing  for 
every  now  and  then  he  would  send  mysterious  letters  to 
different  persons  in  New  York  City.  At  that  time  one  of 
his  delusions  was  that  he  was  a  great  statesman  and  that 
the  United  States  government  had  appointed  him  am- 
bassador, but  that  the  "gang"  in  New  York  City  had 
someone  without  ability  to  impersonate  him  so  that  he 
lost  his  appointment.  This  led  him  to  send  many  letters 
to  the  State  Department  at  Washington.  On  one  occa- 
sion he  appeared  there  and  made  an  unsuccessful  attempt 
to  see  the  President's  daughter.  He  was  arrested  by  the 
secret  service  men  and  returned  to  New  York,,  but  again  a 


102  PSYCHANALYSIS 

judge  allowed  him  to  remain  at  large.  He  immediately 
returned  to  Canada  and  continued  to  annoy  the  Canadian 
government  with  all  kinds  of  crazy  letters.  The  Canadian 
government  was  quicker  than  a  New  York  Supreme  Court 
jury  to  recognize  a  lunatic,  for  he  was  arrested,  declared 
insane  and  deported  to  the  United  States  as  an  undesirable 
alien.  He  was  again  brought  to  the  psychopathic  ward 
in  Bellevue  where  I  had  occasion  to  examine  him.  He 
expressed  his  former  delusions,  but  they  were  more 
systematized  and  complicated.  He  showed  considerable 
mental  deterioration,  so  that  he  was  unable  to  hide  his 
delusions.  He  thought  that  the  daughter  of  the  President 
of  the  United  States  came  to  visit  him  in  the  hospital  and 
he  spoke  quite  freely  about  it.  Indeed,  the  psychosis  was 
so  apparent  that  he  was  soon  adjudged  insane  and  com- 
mitted to  the  Manhattan  State  Hospital. 

The  characteristic  development,  the  delusions  of  perse- 
cution, the  erotomania  (girl  pupils,  President's  daughter, 
and  many  women  who  came  to  set  him  free  from  the 
Central  Islip  State  Hospital)  and  the  delusions  of  grandeur 
(statesman,  ambassador)  present  a  typical  picture  of  a 
paranoid  condition. 

I  have  not  seen  the  patient  for  more  than  two  years,  but 
I  am  quite  sure  that  very  little  new  light  has  been  thrown 
on  the  case  since  then.  Now  I  do  not  expect  to  clear  up 
all  the  obscure  points  in  this  case.  All  I  hope  to  do  is  to 
demonstrate  thereby  certain  mechanisms  brought  out  by 
Freud  in  his  psychanalytical  remarks  on  a  Case  of  Paranoia1 
and  at  the  same  time  to  give  a  rather  full  review  of  Freud's 
paper  in  order  to  stimulate  further  interest  in  this  subject. 

According  to  Freud  the  paranoiac  character  lies  in  the 


PSYCHOLOGICAL    MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  193 

fact  that  as  a  reaction  to  a  defense  against  a  homosexual 
wish-phantasy  there  results  a  delusion  of  persecution. 
This  conclusion  has  been  reached  not  only  by  Freud,  but 
also  by  Jung,  Ferenczi,2  and  Maeder,3  after  having  ob- 
served for  years  a  number  of  cases  of  paranoia  in  men  and 
women  of  different  races,  callings  and  social  positions. 
This  statement  may  seem  strange  on  superficial  considera- 
tion, as  it  is  generally  known  that  the  etiological  factors 
usually  found  in  paranoia  deal  rather  more  with  social 
injuries  and  depreciations  than  with  matters  sexual,  but 
if  we  trace  the  social  relations  and  at  the  same  time  bear 
in  mind  Freud's  idea  of  sexuality  we  find  that  they  invari- 
ably lead  to  unconscious  homosexual  wish-phantasies. 

Studies  made  by  Freud4  and  Sadger5  have  called 
attention  to  a  stage  in  the  history  of  the  development  of 
the  libido  which  is  passed  on  the  way  from  autoerotism  to 
object  love.  This  stage  has  been  designated  as  narcism 
and  consists  in  the  fact  that  the  developing  individual, 
while  collecting  into  a  unit  his  active  autoerotic  sexual 
impulses  in  order  to  gain  a  love  object,  takes  first  himself, 
his  own  body,  as  the  love  object,  before  going  over  to  the 
object  selection  of  a  strange  person.  This  intermediate 
phase  between  autoerotism  and  object  love  is  normally 
perhaps  indispensable,  and  in  a  great  many  persons  it  lasts 
for  a  long  time.  The  genitals  may  then  be  the  chief  thing 
in  this  self  which  is  taken  as  the  love  object.  The  re- 
maining road  may  lead  to  the  choice  of  an  object  with 
similar  genitals  and  then  from  the  homosexual  object 
selection  to  the  heterosexual.  It  is  assumed  that  those 
who  remained  homosexual  were  unable  to  free  themselves 
from  the  desire  of  requiring  genitals  similar  to  their  own 

13 


194  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

in  the  love  object.  This  desire  is  also  furthered  by  the 
infantile  sexual  theories  which  attribute  the  penis  to  both 
Bexes.  In  the  normal  course  of  development  where  the 
heterosexual  object  selection  has  been  attained  the  homo- 
sexual feelings  are  not  necessarily  abrogated  or  suspended, 
but  they  are  simply  pushed  away  from  the  sexual  aim  and 
directed  to  new  uses.  They  help  in  the  formation  of  those 
components  which  constitute  the  social  feelings  and  thus 
contribute  to  the  maintenance  of  friendship,  camaraderie 
and  public  spirit.  This  is  the  so-called  process  of  subli- 
mation. All  the  manifest  homosexuals  wTho  resist  their 
sensual  feeling  taken  an  unusual  interest  in  human  affairs.* 
In  his  "Three  Contributions  to  the  Sexual  Theory/* 
Freud  states  that  every  stage  of  development  of  the  psycho- 
sexuality  offers  a  possibility  for  "fixation"  which  may 
thus  result  in  a  type  of  character.  Persons  who  do  not 
get  away  altogether  from  the  stage  of  narcism,  who  are 
fixed  there  on  some  point  which  may  act  as  a  morbid  dis- 
position, are  exposed  to  the  danger  lest  a  high  tide  of 
libido,  finding  no  other  outlet,  might  subject  their  social 
feelings  to  a  sexualization  and  thus  cause  a  retrogression 
of  their  sublimation  which  was  acquired  during  the 
development.  Such  a  state  may  come  about  by  anything 
that  produces  a  backward  coursing  of  the  libido  (regres- 
sion). It  may  be  brought  about  by  a  collateral  reinforce- 
ment through  a  disappointment  in  the  woman,  or  through 
a  failure  in  social  relations  to  the  man,  or  through  a 
general  increase  in  libido  which  becomes  too  violent  to  be 

*  For  a  full  discussion  of  pathological  homosexuality  see  my  paper: 
"The  Conception  of  Homosexuality,"  Journal  of  the  American  Medical 
Association,  Aug.  2,  1913. 


PSYCHOLOGICAL    MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  195 

discharged  by  the  roads  open  to  it,  and  hence  breaks  the 
dam  at  the  weakest  portion  of  the  structure.  As  analysis 
shows  that  paranoiacs  endeavor  to  defend  themselves 
against  such  a  sexualization  of  their  social  feelings,  we 
are  forced  to  assume  that  the  weak  part  of  their  develop- 
ment is  to  be  found  in  the  parts  between  auto-erotism, 
narcism  and  homosexuality.  It  is  there  that  their  morbid 
disposition  lies.  When  we  read  the  personal  history  of 
E.  R.  we  find  the  following  passages:  "At  an  early  age  he 
was  employed  in  a  factory.  He  resented  the  vulgar  sur- 
roundings and  blamed  his  relatives  for  permitting  him  to 
work  there.  At  sixteen  years  of  age  he  decided  to  enter 
college  and  worked  his  way  through.  He  worked  hard 
and  stood  well  in  the  class.  He  quarreled  with  classmates 
and  assumed  a  high  moral  plane.  He  would  not  visit 
common  places  when  friends  went  on  a  frolic,  etc." 

In  other  words,  there  seems  to  have  been  some  fixation 
at  the  phases  of  autoerotism  and  narcism,  and  a  failure  of 
sublimation  of  his  homosexual  component.  I  well  remem- 
ber how  shut  in  and  seclusive  he  was  while  at  college. 
During  the  noon  recess  when  the  students  would  chat 
together  in  small  groups  he  could  be  seen  standing  alone 
near  some  wall.  As  far  as  I  know  he  did  not  have  a  single 
friend.  From  his  history  we  gather  that  the  psychosis 
became  manifest  as  soon  as  he  began  teaching  school,  i.e., 
as  soon  as  an  adjustment  to  environment  was  necessary. 
For  adjustment  to  environments  is  nothing  but  a  reaction 
to  social  stimuli.  It  is  nothing  but  a  give  and  take  of 
libido.  Here  no  transference  was  possible  because  his 
sublimation  was  made  retrogressive  and  all  his  social 


196  PSYCHANALYSIS 

feelings  were  sexualized.  The  reaction  against  his 
unconscious  homosexual  wish-phantasy  caused  him  to 
think  that  he  was  slighted  by  his  principal  and  the  other 
teachers.  In  his  own  words — "  they  were  trying  to  work 
up  a  badger  game"  on  him.  The  normal  relations  be- 
tween teacher  and  pupil  became  impossible.  He  would 
not  permit  his  girl  pupils  to  come  near  him  because  he 
thought  they  had  some  designs  on  him.  This  simply 
means  that  he  previously  entertained  some  sexual  ideas 
about  them  or  they  probably  represented  a  fixation  from 
an  early  age. 

In  1903  he  married  after  a  short  courtship.  He  soon 
began  to  accuse  his  wife  of  infidelity  with  his  brother  and 
brother-in-law,  Mr.  S.  He  also  accused  Mr.  S.  of  improper 
relations  with  his  own  wife  (patient's  sister)  and  a  few 
years  later  he  also  accused  him  of  improper  relations  with 
his  mother.  S.  was  the  arch  conspirator  and  his  brother 
who  was  also  one  of  the  conspirators  was  under  S.'s  influ- 
ence. There  was  apparently  a  conflict  between  his  con- 
scious heterosexuality  and  his  unconscious  homosexuality. 
For  a  time  his  heterosexuality  triumphed  and  he  married 
after  a  short  courtship,  but  the  unconscious  homosexu- 
ality gained  the  upper  hand  and  he  then  began  to  accuse 
his  wife  of  infidelity  with  those  men  whom  he  himself 
unconsciously  loved,  i.e.,  he  projected  his  homosexuality 
to  his  wife. 

But6  when  we  accept  the  homosexual  wish-phantasy  to 
love  the  man  as  the  nucleus  of  the  conflict  in  paranoia  of 
men,  we  at  once  find  that  it  is  contradicted  by  all  the 
familiar  principal  forms  of  paranoia.  Thus  the  sentence 
"I  love  him"  (the  man)  is  contradicted  by  the  delusion 


PSYCHOLOGICAL   MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  197 

of  persecution  which  loudly  proclaims  "  I  do  not  love  him 
■ — I  rather  hate  him."  However,  the  mechanism  of  the 
symptom  formation  in  paranoia  demands  that  the  inner 
perception,  the  feeling,  should  be  replaced  by  a  perception 
from  without.  The  sentence  "I  rather  hate  him"  there- 
fore becomes  transformed  through  projection  into  the 
sentence  "he  hates  (persecutes)  me  which  justifies  my 
hating  him."  The  active  unconscious  feeling  thus 
appears  as  a  result  of  an  outer  perception  "I  really  do 
not  love  him — I  hate  him — because  he  persecutes  me." 

Observation  leaves  no  doubt  that  the  persecutor  was 
once  loved  and  respected.  One  of  my  paranoid  patients, 
D.  S.,  talked  about  his  arch  conspirator  Healy  as  follows: 
"  I  wanted  him  to  take  off  all  the  influences,  but  he  would 

not  do  it I  had  all  sorts  of  pains  around  the 

heart  and  I  thought  I  would  die.  I  felt  like  dropping.  I 
had  lots  of  night  losses.  I  was  always  drawn  to  him.  I 
couldn't  keep  away  from  him."  (Note  the  association 
between  night  losses  and  being  drawn  to  him.) 

Another  point  of  attack  for  the  contradiction  is  the 
erotomania  which  maintains  "I  do  not  love  him — I  love 
them."  (E.  R.  always  maintained  that  many  ladies  came 
to  help  him  and  that  the  president's  daughter  was  in  love 
with  him,  etc.).  But  the  same  impulsion  to  projection 
changes  the  sentence  into  "I  notice  that  they  love  me." 
We  then  have  "I  do  not  love  him — I  love  her — because 
she  loves  me."  Many  cases  of  erotomania  could  give  the 
impression  of  exaggerated  or  distorted  heterosexual  fixa- 
tion if  we  were  not  aware  of  the  fact  that  all  these  loves 
do  not  start  with  inner  perceptions  of  loving,  but  are  feel- 
ings of  being  loved  coming  from  without.     Thus  R.,  a  stage 


198  P8YCHANA.LY8IS 

hand  who  was  commit  tod  to  the  Central  Islip  Hospital 
because  he  imagined  that  a  certain  well-known  actress 
was  in  love  with  him  and  who  amioyed  her  with  his  atten- 
tions, excused  himself  by  saying  that  he  was  sure  she  loved 
him.  Otherwise,  he  said,  he  would  not  have  forced  his 
attention  on  her.  He  was,  however,  unable  to  mention  a 
single  instance  to  justify  his  statement. 

The  third  contradiction  would  be  the  delusions  of 
jealousy  which  were  also  present  in  our  patient. 

In  the  delusions  of  jealousy  of  alcoholics  we  fully  under- 
stand the  part  played  by  alcohol.  It  removes  inhibitions 
and  causes  a  regression  of  sublimation.  In  vino  Veritas. 
The  man  is  often  driven  to  drink  through  disappointment 
in  the  woman,  which  usually  means  he  goes  to  the  saloon 
or  club  in  the  company  of  men  who  give  him  the  emotional 
gratification  which  he  misses  at  home.  But  as  soon  as  the 
men  become  objects  of  a  stronger  libidinous  occupation 
in  his  unconscious  he  defends  himself  through  a  third 
form  of  contradiction  "  Not  I  love  the  man — she  loves  him," 
and  he  then  suspects  his  wife  with  all  the  men  he  attempted 
to  love.  In  our  patient,  who  is  a  total  abstainer,  the  alcohol 
naturally  played  no  part. 

One  may  now  think  that  the  three  links  of  a  sentence 
"I  love  him"  would  only  admit  three  forms  of  contra- 
diction, viz.,  the  delusions  of  jealousy  contradict  the  sub- 
ject; the  delusions  of  persecutions,  the  verb,  and  the 
erotomania,  the  object.  However,  there  is  still  a  fourth 
form  of  contradiction  forming  the  total  rejection  of  the 
whole  sentence.  The  sentence  reads:  I  do  not  love  at  all, 
and  hence  I  love  nobody,  and  as  the  libido  must  be  some- 
where the  sentence  is  psychologically  equivalent  to  the 


PSYCHOLOGICAL    MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  199 

sentence:  "I  only  love  myself."  This  form  of  contra- 
diction results  in  the  delusion  of  grandeur  which  we  conceive 
as  a  sexual  overestimation  of  one's  own  ego  and  which  can 
be  put  side  by  side  with  the  familiar  overestimation  of 
the  love  object.7  In  our  patient  this  manifests  itself  in 
his  delusions  of  being  an  ambassador  and  many  similar 
ones. 

We  can  now  understand  some  of  the  patient's  delusions. 
Mr.  S.,  his  brother-in-law,  was  at  first  one  of  his  best 
friends.  The  unconscious  homosexual  transference  went 
too  far  and  in  his  defense  against  it,  the  projection  mechan- 
ism turns  S.  into  a  persecutor.  What  are  the  contents  of 
the  persecution?  The  patient  answers  this  as  follows: 
"He  is  trying  to  ruin  my  home  and  my  own  immediate 

family,  that  is    my  wife  and  sister he  is  not 

a  good  man I  accuse  him  of  improper  relations 

with  my  sister  (that  is,  his  own  wife).  (Taken  from  hos- 
pital records.) 

I  could  not  elicit  from  the  patient  what  these  improper 
relations  were.  Whenever  I  broached  the  subject  he 
became  excited,  but  uncommunicative.  On  a  number  of 
occasions,  however,  he  directly  accused  Mr.  S.  of  being  a 
pervert  and  a  degenerate.  That  points  to  the  fact  that 
the  improper  relations  were  of  that  nature,  for  what  other 
relations  between  husband  and  wife  could  be  considered 
improper? 

I  here  call  your  attention  to  a  very  important  psycho- 
logical mechanism,  the  mechanism  of  identification. 
Freuds  tells  us  that  the  identification  mechanism  enables 
the  patients  to  represent  in  their  symptoms  the  experience 
of  a  great  number  of  persons.     They  can  suffer,  as  it  were, 


200  PSYCHANALYSIS 

for  a  whole  mass  of  people  and  impersonate  all  the  parts 
of  a  drama  by  means  of  their  individual  resources.  It  is 
not  the  simple  hysterical  imitation,  but  an  unconscious 
mechanism.  It  is  a  sympathy  based  upon  the  same  etologi- 
cal  claims.  It  expresses  an  "as  though"  and  refers  to 
something  common  which  has  remained  in  the  unconscious. 
In  hysteria  we  know  identification  is  most  often  used  to 
express  sexual  community.  Hysterics  identify  themselves 
most  easily  with  persons  with  whom  they  had  real  or 
imaginary  sexual  relations  or  with  those  who  had  sexual 
relations  with  the  same  person.8  Bearing  in  mind  this 
mechanism,  we  must  conclude  that  the  three  persons  sus- 
pected of  sexual  relations  with  S.  must  have  something 
in  common  for  the  patient.  This,  of  course,  is  not  difficult 
to  divine.  We  all  know  that  mother,  sister,  and  wife  are 
often  identified  even  in  the  normal.9  He  was  once  in  love 
with  all  of  them,  but  as  they  could  not  gratify  him,  he 
unconsciously  turned  to  homosexuality,  to  S.  However, 
as  he  had  suppressed  the  unconscious  homosexual  wish 
feeling  for  S.,  he  then  consciously  perceived  that  not  he 
loves  S,  but  they  love  him.  In  other  words,  an  inner 
perception  was  suppressed  and  as  a  substitute  its  con- 
tent came  to  consciousness  as  an  outer  perception  after  it 
had  been  subjected  to  disfigurement.  This  is  the  mechan- 
ism of  projection.  This  identification  could  also  be  found 
in  his  other  delusions  as  the  psychosis  continued  to  prog- 
ress. While  in  the  Bloomingdale  Hospital  he  imagined 
that  Dr.  D.  was  his  wife  in  disguise.  In  the  Central  Islip 
Hospital  he  imagined  that  I  was  his  wife  in  disguise.  One 
incident  in  particular  illustrates  this  point.  On  one 
occasion  I  made  my  night  rounds  at  11.30  o'clock,  rather 


PSYCHOLOGICAL   MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  201 

later  than  usual.  He  detained  me  for  some  time  with 
many  irrelevant  questions.  The  next  morning  the  super- 
visor brought  me  a  letter  which  he  wrote  to  his  wife  in 
which  there  was  the  following  passage,  "I  am  very  sorry 
for  having  been  so  rude  last  night,  but  it  was  not  my  fault. 
Why  did  you  appear  disguised  as  Dr.  Brill  in  a  strange 
uniform?  Why  can't  you  come  to  me  in  your  own  sweet 
form?"  Why  did  he  think  that  the  doctors  were  his  wife 
in  disguise?  This  question  is  very  simple  when  we  think 
of  the  mechanism  of  transference  in  reference  to  doctor 
and  patient,  with  which  I  hope  all  my  readers  are  familiar.10 
From  my  own  experience  with  our  patient  I  know  that  the 
transference  first  took  the  same  course  as  in  any  neurosis, 
but  as  the  patient  defended  himself  against  this  homosex- 
ual wish-phantasy,  he  at  first  identified  the  doctor  with 
his  wife  and  then  the  idea  was  "I  do  not  love  him,  but  her. 
It  is  not  Dr.  D.  or  Dr.  Brill.  It  is  my  wife."  But  as  the 
psychosis  progressed  it  was  then  transformed  into  the 
idea  "I  do  not  love  him — I  rather  hate  him  because  he 
persecutes  me,"  which  actually  turned  out  to  be  the  case. 
After  the  patient  was  recommitted  to  Bellevue  Hospital 
he  told  me  that  I  was  one  of  the  "gang."  I  was  no  longer 
his  wife  in  disguise,  but  his  enemy.  The  distortion  that 
took  place  in  the  projection  mechanism  was  an  emotional 
transformation.  What  should  have  been  perceived  as 
love  subjectively  was  perceived  as  hatred  objectively. 

But  as  the  mechanism  of  projection  does  not  play 
the  same  part  in  all  forms  of  paranoia  and  as  it  is  also 
found  in  other  psychic  occurrences  such  as  in  the  normal 
we  cannot  consider  it  the  most  essential  and  pathog- 
nomonic element  of  paranoia.     Let  us    therefore  tern- 


202  PSTCHANALYSIS 

porarily  leave  the  study  of  projection,  and  with  it  the 
mechanism  of  the  paranoic  symptom  formation,  and  turn 
our  attention  to  the  form  of  repression  which  is  more 
intimately  connected  with  the  development  of  the  libido 
and  its  disposition  than  with  the  form  of  the  symptom 
formation. 

A  more  thorough  examination  shows  that  the  process 
of  repression  can  be  divided  into  three  phases.  The  first 
phase  consists  in  fixation,  which  is  the  forerunner  and  the 
determinant  of  every  repression.  The  fact  of  fixation  may 
be  expressed  by  stating  that  an  impulse  or  part  thereof  does 
not  experience  what  may  be  regarded  as  normal  develop- 
ment, and  consequently  remains  in  an  infantile  stage.  Its 
libidinous  emanation  behaves  toward  the  later  psychic  for- 
mations as  if  it  belonged  to  the  system  of  the  unconscious, 
or  as  if  it  were  repressed.  Such  fixation  of  the  impulses 
may  already  contain  the  disposition  for  the  later  disease 
and,  above  all,  the  determinants  for  the  failure  of  the  third 
phase  of  the  repression. 

The  second  phase  of  the  repression  is  the  actual  repres- 
sion which  we  have  hitherto  had  in  mind.  It  emanates 
from  the  more  highly  developed  conscious  systems  of  the 
ego  and  may  be  designated  as  an  "after  repression."  It 
gives  the  impression  of  a  real  active  process,  whereas  the 
fixation  is  represented  as  a  passive  backwardness.  Re- 
pression affects  either  the  psychic  descendants  of  those 
primary  impulses  which  have  remained  backward  if  by 
virtue  of  their  enforcement  they  come  into  conflict  with 
the  ego  (or  with  its  proper  impulses)  or  with  such  psychic 
feelings  against  which  there  is  a  strong  antipathy  for  other 
reasons.     This  aversion,   however,   would  not  result  in 


PSYCHOLOGICAL    MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  203 

repression  if  there  did  not  already  exist  some  connection 
between  the  repugnant  strivings  to  be  repressed  and  those 
already  repressed. 

The  third  phase  is  the  failure  of  the  repression,  the  break- 
ing through,  or  the  return  of  the  repression.  This  break- 
ing through  results  from  the  point  of  fixation  and  mani- 
fests a  regression  of  the  development  of  the  libido  up  to 
this  point.  It  stands  to  reason  that  there  may  be  as  many 
fixations  as  there  are  stages  of  development  of  the  libido. 


It  is  impossible  to  demonstrate  these  minute  mechan- 
isms in  our  patient.  As  I  said  above,  I  have  not  seen 
him  for  years,  so  that  I  am  unable  to  tell  what  has  taken 
place  since  then.  In  his  profound  analysis  of  the  case  of 
Schreber,  Freud  shows  that  even  after  the  patient  returned 
to  society  and  found  that  he  was  mistaken  in  his  idea  that 
the  world  came  to  an  end,  he  was  nevertheless  certain 
that  the  world  had  come  to  an  end  while  he  was  sick  and 
what  he  now  saw  before  him  was  not  really  the  same 
world.  Such  transformations  of  the  world  are  quite 
common  in  paranoia.  I  know  a  number  of  paranoiacs 
who  went  through  a  stormy  period  lasting  for  years,  but 
who  now  live  contentedly,  as  if  in  another  world.  They 
do  not  care  for  anything,  as  nothing  is  real  to  them.  They 
have  withdrawn  their  sum  of  libido  from  the  persons  of 
their  environment  and  the  outer  world.  The  end  of  the 
world  is  the  projection  of  this  internal  catastrophe. 
Their  subjective  world  came  to  an  end  since  they  withdrew 
their  love  from  it.  By  a  secondary  rationalization  the 
patients  then  explain  whatever  obtrudes  itself  upon  them 
as  something  intangible  and  fit  it  in  with  their  own 
system.     Thus  one  of  my  paranoid  patients  who  considers 


204  PSYCHANALYSIS 

himself  a  sort  of  Messiah  denies  the  reality  of  his  own  parents 
by  Baying  that  they  are  only  shadows  made  by  his  enemy,  the 
devil,  whom  he  has  not  yet  entirely  subdued.  Another  para- 
noiac, in  the  Central  Islip  State  Hospital,  who  represented 
himself  as  a  second  Christ,  spends  most  of  his  time  sewing  out 
on  cloth  crude  scenes  containing  many  buildings  interspersed 
with  pictures  of  the  doctors.  He  explained  all  this  very 
minutely  as  the  new  world  system,  and  although  he 
labeled  the  doctors  with  their  proper  names  he  neverthe- 
less maintained  that  they  were  other  persons  concerning 
whom  he  knew  much  that  could  not  be  told.  Thus  the 
paranoiac  builds  up  again  with  his  delusions  a  new  world 
in  which  he  can  live.  The  delusional  formations  which 
we  take  up  as  the  morbid  productions  are,  in  reality,  a 
curative  attempt,  a  reconstruction  as  it  were.  The 
patient  usually  succeeds  in  accomplishing  this  after  the 
catastrophe,  and  in  this  way  he  regains  his  relations  to 
the  persons  and  things  of  this  world.  Hence  the  process 
of  repression  consists  in  a  withdrawal  of  the  libido  from 
persons  and  things  that  were  previously  loved.  This  is 
brought  about  mutely  and  without  our  knowledge. 
What  we  perceive  as  the  disturbance  is  really  the  curative 
process,  which  makes  the  repression  retrogressive  and 
reconducts  the  libido  to  the  persons  it  originally  left.  It 
is  brought  about  in  paranoia  by  way  of  projection.  It 
was  therefore  incorrect  to  say  that  the  inner  suppressed 
feelings  are  outwardly  projected.  It  is  better  to  say  that 
what  was  inwardly  suspended  returns  from  without. 

However,11  a  withdrawal  of  libido  is  not  an  exclusive 
occurrence  in  paranoia,  nor  does  its  occurrence  anywhere 


PSYCHOLOGICAL   MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  205 

necessarily  follow  by  disastrous  consequences.  Indeed, 
in  normal  life,  there  is  a  constant  withdrawal  of  libido 
from  persons  and  objects  without  resulting  in  paranoia  or 
other  neuroses.  It  merely  causes  a  special  psychic  mood. 
The  withdrawal  of  libido  as  such  cannot  therefore  be 
considered  as  pathogenic  of  paranoia.  It  requires  a 
special  character  to  distinguish  the  paranoiac  withdrawal 
of  libido  from  other  kinds  of  the  same  process.  This  is 
readily  found  when  we  follow  the  further  utilization  of  the 
libido  thus  withdrawn.  Normally  we  immediately  seek 
a  substitute  for  the  suspended  attachment  and  until  one 
is  found  the  libido  floats  freely  in  the  psyche  and  causes 
tensions  which  influence  our  moods.  In  hysteria  the 
freed  sum  of  libido  becomes  transformed  into  bodily 
innervations  or  fear.  Clinical  indications  teach  us  that 
in  paranoia  a  special  use  is  made  of  the  libido  which  is 
withdrawn  from  the  object.  We  know  that  most  cases 
of  paranoia  evince  delusions  of  grandeur  and  that  the 
delusions  of  grandeur  may  themselves  constitute  a  paran- 
oia. From  this  we  conclude  that  the  freed  libido  in 
paranoia  is  thrown  back  on  the  ego  and  serves  to  magnify 
it.  Thus  it  again  reaches  to  the  familiar  stage  of  narcism 
from  the  development  of  the  libido  in  which  one's  own 
ego  was  the  only  sexual  object.  "It  is  this  clinical  fact 
that  teaches  us  that  paranoiacs  have  brought  along  a 
fixation  in  narcism  and  we  therefore  assert  that  the  return 
from  the  sublimated  homosexuality  to  narcism  furnishes  the 
sum  of  regression  which  is  characteristic  for  paranoia."12 
The  near  relations  between  paranoia  and  dementia 
praecox  are  as  follows:  Paranoia  is  to  be  considered  an 
independent  clinical  type  notwithstanding  the  fact  that 


206  PSYCHANALYSIS 

it  is  complicated  by  schizophrenic  features.  Considered 
under  the  guise  of  the  libido-theory,  it  is  distinguished 
from  dementia  precox  by  another  localization  of  the  pre- 
disposed fixation  and  by  another  mechanism  of  the  return 
(symptom  formation).  The  principal  character  of  the 
actual  repression — the  removal  of  the  libido  and  regression 
to  the  ego — is  common  to  both.  In  dementia  prsecox 
Abraham  has  thoroughly  demonstrated  that  the  character- 
istic of  the  withdrawal  of  the  libido  from  the  outer  world  is 
especially  clear.  From  this  character  we  infer  that  the  re- 
pression is  brought  about  by  the  withdrawal  of  libido.  The 
phase  of  active  hallucinations  is  to  be  conceived  as  a  struggle 
between  the  repression  and  the  effort  toward  a  cure,  which  is 
to  bring  back  the  libido  to  its  object.  But  this  striving  toward 
adjustment  does  not  make  use  of  the  mechanism  of 
projection  as  in  paranoia,  but  of  the  (hysterical)  hallucina- 
tory mechanism.  This  shows  one  of  its  marked  differ- 
entiations from  paranoia.  The  other  differentiation  is 
to  be  found  in  the  termination  of  dementia  praecox.  In 
general  the  outcome  in  the  latter  is  more  unfavorable 
than  in  paranoia.  The  victory  does  not  remain  in  the 
reconstruction,  as  in  paranoia,  but  in  the  repression. 
The  regression  not  only  goes  as  far  as  narcism  and  mani- 
fests itself  as  delusions  of  grandeur,  but  it  proceeds  to  the 
complete  abandonment  of  the  object  love  and  returns  to 
the  infantile  autoerotism.  The  predisposed  fixation 
therefore  must  lie  further  back  than  the  one  in  paranoia. 
It  must  exist  in  the  beginning  of  development,  striving 
from  autoerotism  to  object  love.  Like  so  many  others 
Freud  considers  the  term  dementia  praecox  awkward.  He 
also  objects  to   Bleuler's  designation  of  Schizophrenia. 


PSYCHOLOGICAL    MECHANISMS    OF    PARANOIA  207 

He  contends  that  the  latter  term  appears  right  only  when 
one  does  not  think  of  its  verbal  significance  and  that  it  is 
too  prejudicial  inasmuch  as  it  makes  use  of  a  theoretically 
postulated  character  which  does  not  belong  exclusively 
to  the  affection  and,  in  the  light  of  other  views  cannot  be 
considered  as  the  essential  one.  He  proposes  the  name 
paraphrenia,  the  indefinite  content  of  which  expresses  its 
relation  to  paranoia  and  hebephrenia. 

Refekences 

1.  Jahrbuch  f  ur  Psychoanalytische  u.  Psychopathologische  Forsch- 
ungen,  Bleuler-Freud,  Vol.  III. 

2.  Ueber  die  Rolle  der  Homosexualitat  in  der  Pathogenese  der 
Paranoia,  I.  c,  p.  101;  also,  Reizung  der  Analen  erogenen  Zonen  als 
auslosende  Ursache  der  Paranoia,  Zentralblatt  fur  Psychoanalyse, 
August,  1911. 

3.  Psychologische  Untersuchungen  an  Dementia  Prsecox,  I.  c, 
Vol.  II,  1910.  Similar  conclusions  have  been  reached  by  K.  Abraham, 
in  reference  to  Dementia  prsecox:  Die  psychosexuellen  Differenzen 
der  Hysterie  und  der  Dementia  Prsecox,  Zentralblatt  fur  Nervenheil- 
kunde  und  Psychiatrie,  July,  1908. 

4.  Eine  Kindheitserrinerung  des  Leonardo  da  Vinci.  Schriften  zur 
angewandten  Seelenkunde,  1910,  No.  7. 

5.  Ein  Fall  von  multipler  Perversion  mit  hysterischen  Obszenen, 
Jahrbuch  fur  Psychoanalytische  und  Psychopathologische  Forsch- 
ungen,  II,  1910. 

6.  Paraphrased  from  Freud,  I.  c. 

7.  Cf.  Abraham  and  Maeder,  I.  c. 

8.  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams,  p.  126.  The  Macmillan  Co., 
New  York. 

9.  Cf.  Chap.  X. 

10.  Cf.  Ferenczi:  Introjection  und  Uebertragung,  Jahrbuch  fur 
Psychoanal.  und  Psychopatholog.  Forschungen,  1910,  Vol.  I;  also 
Jones:  The  Action  of  Suggestion  in  Psychotherapy,  Journal  of 
Abnormal  Psychology,  Dec,  1910. 

11.  Paraphrased  from  Freud,  I.  c. 

12.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  64. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

PSYCHOPATHOLOGY  OF  EVERY-DAY  LIFE 

Freud's    Conception  of    Consciousness,  Unconscious    and 

Foreconscious 

"Men's  little  ways  are  usually  more  interesting  and  often  more 
instructive  than  their  grand  manners.  When  they  are  off  guard  they 
frequently  show  to  better  advantage  than  when  they  are  on  parade." 
—Dr.  Henry  Van  Dyke. 

In  my  discussion  of  dreams  and  the  psychoneurotic 
mechanisms  I  have  attempted  to  show  that  they  are  the 
result  of  a  conflict  between  two  psychic  streams  of  contrary 
tendencies,  each  striving  for  expression,  the  ultimate  out- 
come of  which  is  a  compromise  between  them.  Each  has  to 
make  concessions,  thus  meeting  the  other  half  way,  and  the 
result  of  this  mutual  accommodation  is  then  a  dream  or 
a  psychoneurotic  symptom  which  represents  the  fufilment 
of  a  wish.  These  mechanisms  are  not  conscious,  but  rather 
unconscious  processes.  Unconscious,  according  to  Freud, 
includes  all  those  psychic  manifestations  of  which  the  person 
is  unaware.  He  actually  does  not  discover  them,  and  they 
can  only  be  brought  to  the  surface  by  analysis.  The  un- 
conscious is  made  up  of  the  repressed  material,  that  is,  the 
sum  total  of  those  psychic  processes  which  have  been  crowded 
out  of  consciousness  from  the  very  beginning  of  childhood. 

Thus,  all  the  primitive  impulses  that  have  been  curbed  and 

208 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  209 

inhibited  with  the  development  of  the  individual  are  in 
a  state  of  repression.  They  form  points  of  crystallization 
for  the  later  repressions  which  mainly  consist  of  erotic 
material.  The  later  experiences  are  naturally  not  sub- 
jected to  the  same  amount  of  repression  as  the  earlier  and 
more  primitive  ones,  hence  some  of  them  may  remain  in 
what  Freud  calls  the  foreconscious. 

As  shown  above  the  dream  is  the  function  of  two  separate 
systems.  One  subjects  the  activity  of  the  other  to  a  critique, 
which  results  in  an  exclusion  from  consciousness.  The  criti- 
cizing system  is  in  closer  relation  to  consciousness  than 
the  one  criticized.  The  former,  the  foreconscious,  stands 
like  a  screen  between  the  unconscious  and  consciousness. 
Both  are  unconscious  in  the  psychological  sense,  but  the 
unconscious  is  incapable  of  consciousness  without  external 
aid,  while  the  foreconscious  can  reach  consciousness  after 
it  fulfils  certain  conditions  regarding  censorship.  It  is  the 
latter  that  directs  our  waking  life  and  determines  our  volun- 
tary conscious  actions.  Consciousness,  as  such,  plays  a 
very  small  part,  and  is  conceived  by  Freud  as  a  sensory  organ 
for  the  perception  of  psychic  qualities.  The  repressed 
material  or  the  unconscious  consists  of  wishes  which  are 
always  active  and  strive  for  expression  whenever  they  have 
an  opportunity  to  unite  with  an  emotion  from  conscious 
life.  They  thus  determine  all  our  actions,  and  our  char- 
acter is'mainly  based  on  memory  traces  of  those  impressions 
that  have  influenced  us  most  strongly — those  of  our  early 
youth — which  almost  never  become  conscious. 

As  we  pointed  out  above,  the  later  repressions  are  made 
up  of  painful  and  intolerable  thoughts  which  are  inten- 
tionally   crowded    out    of    consciousness.      The    individ- 

14 


210  PSYCHANALYSIS 

ual  intentionally  strives  to  forget  them  and  he  seemingly 
.succeeds.  This  is  a  protective  mechanism  for  the  good 
of  the  organism,  for  what  would  happen  to  us  if  we  were 
always  confronted  by  the  numberless  painful  and  dis- 
agreeable incidents  of  life?  However,  what  we  imagine 
to  be  forgotten  remains  in  the  unconscious  in  a  repressed 
state  and  forms  a  complex.  The  complex  remains  in  an 
inert  state  until  incited  by  some  association.  Thus,  an 
elderly  woman  experiences  a  feeling  of  uneasiness  when- 
ever she  by  chance  sees  a  red-haired  person.  She  is 
unable  to  account  for  it,  and  of  late  it  has  especially 
annoyed  her  because  one  of  the  members  of  her  club 
happens  to  be  of  the  Titian  type.  Analysis  showed  that 
forty-eight  years  ago  she  had  a  very  unpleasant  experience 
with  a  red-haired  schoolmate.  She  was  not  at  all  cogni- 
zant of  this  incident  each  time  she  felt  that  "sense  of 
uneasiness"  and  was  wont  to  attribute  it  to  the  popular 
prejudice.  But  as  she  considers  herself  above  such 
prejudice  she  could  not  understand  her  rude  manners 
toward  the  woman  of  the  Titian  type.  It  was  only  after 
a  lengthy  analysis,  after  all  the  resistances  were  broken, 
that  the  original  incident  became  conscious  to  her. 

These  resistances  are  always  active  and  only  during 
sleep  do  they  partially  slacken.  It  is  then  that  the 
repressed  material  comes  to  the  surface  in  the  form  of 
dreams,  but  as  the  resistances  never  lose  their  full  power, 
they  distort  everything  that  passes  them  to  such  an 
extent  that  the  dreamer  cannot  recognize  his  repressed 
thoughts  or  his  unattainable  wishes.  But  it  is  not  only  in 
the  abnormal  states  and  in  the  dream  that  the  repression 
fulfils   wishes.     We    find   that    the   same   influences  are 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  211 

also  evinced  in  our  waking  states  in  psychopathological 
actions  of  every-day  life. 

By  psychopathological  actions  we  understand  those 
incorrect  psychic  activities  which  the  individual  daily 
performs,  but  of  which  he  is  not  conscious  at  the  time 
being.  Among  these  different  manifestations  may  be 
mentioned  lapses  of  memory,  of  talking,  writing,  mis- 
takes, etc.1 

Among  the  lapses  of  memory  we  may  have  the  common 
occurrences  of  forgetting  names,  of  forgetting  words  in 
poetry  or  foreign  words.  In  all  these  cases  we  must  first 
assume  that  the  person  in  question  does  not  suffer  from 
any  nervous  or  mental  affection  producing  qualitative  or 
quantitative  memory  disturbances  and  that  the  things 
forgotten  have  once  been  well  known.  Everyone  is 
familiar  with  the  feeling  of  being  unable  to  recall  a  name 
or  a  word.  We  think  of  a  person  whose  name  we  knew 
well,  but  try  as  hard  as  we  may  the  name  cannot  be 
recalled.  We  see  the  person  in  our  mind's  eye.  We 
think  of  hundreds  of  incidents  and  associations  connected 
with  him,  but  despite  that  his  name  cannot  be  recalled. 
Often  other  names  occur  to  us  which  we  immediately 
recognize  as  false,  yet  they  persist  in  thrusting  themselves 
into  our  minds.  This  may  continue  for  hours  or  days 
until  the  correct  name  comes  unexpectedly  or  we  ask  some- 
one for  it.  We  never  think  of  the  cause  of  our  forgetting 
because  it  is  so  self-evident  nor  do  we  try  to  find  why  we 
suddenly  recalled  this  long-sought-for  name  or  word. 

Freud  tells  us  that  the  reason  for  this  forgetting  is,  in 
many  cases,  due  to  its  direct  or  indirect  association  with 
something    repressed — that    is,    something    disagreeable 


212  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

or  painful.  This  has  been  fully  confirmed  by  such  observ- 
ers as  Bleuler,  Jung,  Riklin,  Maeder  and  Jones.  Person- 
ally I  can  state  that  in  every  case  amenable  to  analysis 
I  could  corroborate  Freud's  observation.  The  following 
examples  will  serve  as  illustrations: 

I.  FORGETTING  OF  NAMES 

(a)  A  young  newspaper  man  to  whom  I  explained 
Freud's  ideas  concerning  the  forgetting  of  names  insisted 
that  this  could  not  be  true  and  to  prove  his  assertion  he 
related  the  following  incident: 

"My  friend  Jack  left  the  city  recently  and  the  other  day  I  wrote 
him  a  letter.  On  addressing  the  envelope  I  failed  to  remember  his 
surname.  I  began  with  'Jack'  and  for  the  life  of  me  I  could  not 
proceed.  After  at  least  five  minutes  thinking  I  finally  recalled  that 
his  surname  was  Murphy.  Now  as  he  is  my  best  friend  I  fail  to  see 
the  disagreeable  or  painful  connection."  I  then  proceeded  to  analyze 
it  by  the  "continuous  association"  method.  I  asked  him  to  concen- 
trate his  mind  on  the  word  Murphy  and  tell  me  all  the  associations  it 
evoked.  He  produced  the  following:  "Murphy  recalls  my  friend 
Jack.  We  went  to  school  together  and  have  been  friends  since." 
He  then  continued  to  give  a  number  of  incidents  connected  with  their 
School  life,  all  of  which  were  of  a  rather  pleasant  nature  and  added: 
"You  see,  I  could  talk  about  Jack  and  myself  for  hours."  Asked 
whether  he  knew  any  other  Murphy  he  was  at  first  pretty  sure  that 
he  did  not,  but  he  soon  recalled  his  friend's  brother  for  whom  he 
entertained  great  regard.  After  awhile  he  recalled  another  Murphy, 
Mr.  Murphy,  of  Tammany  fame.  He  dislikes  Tammany  Hall  and 
its  leader  "  as  every  good  Republican  does,  but  that  is  no  reason  for 
forgetting  Jack's  name."  He  then  continued  to  associate  freely  from 
one  idea  to  another  until  he  suddenly  broke  into  laughter  and  then 
remarked:  "It  is  funny  that  I  did  not  think  of  it  before.  I  now 
remember  another  Murphy,  a  newspaper  man  whom  I  know  very 
well."  Asked  to  tell  something  about  him  he  said:"  This  is  the 
only  man  I  hate"  and  then  delivered  a  long  tirade  against  this  Mr. 
Murphy. 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  213 

We  can  now  understand  why  he  could  not  recall  his 
friend's  name.  The  name  Murphy  was  under  repression 
because  it  represented  a  person  whom  he  hated.  His 
own  friend's  name  was  also  Murphy,  but  to  him  it  was 
always  Jack.  He  always  called  him  Jack  and  in  his  mind 
it  was  Jack  and  not  Murphy.  He  never  corresponded 
with  him  before.  This  was  the  first  time  he  was  obliged 
to  use  Jack's  surname.  He  could  not  recall  it  (1)  because 
it  was  directly  connected  with  something  unpleasant  to 
him  and  (2)  he  could  not  resign  himself  to  give  Jack  the 
name  of  the  man  he  hated. 

The  last  mechanism  is  often  observed  in  such  slips  of 
the  tongue  as  the  following:  While  conversing  Mrs.  S., 
inquiring  about  a  mutual  friend,  said:  "How  is  Mrs. 
Brown?"  She  was  immediately  corrected  by  a  "You 
mean  Mrs.  Blank"  to  which  she  replied  "Yes,  Mrs. 
Blank.  I  made  a  mistake."  There  was  only  one  reason, 
I  thought,  why  she  called  Mrs.  Blank  by  her  maiden  name 
which  was  Brown  and  to  test  my  theory  I  said:  "What 
is  wrong  with  Mr.  Blank?"  She  thoughtlessly  answered 
"Oh,  I  don't  like  him,"  and  then  becoming  conscious  of 
what  she  said  she  showed  her  embarrassment  by  blushing, 
but  she  added  consciously  "I  never  liked  him;  I  am  sorry 
she  married  him." 

Here  the  mistake  showed  her  dislike  for  Mr.  Blank. 
The  repression  fulfills  her  wish  in  not  recognizing  the 
marriage  by  continuing  to  use  the  maiden  name.  It  is 
of  quite  different  significance,  however,  if  the  lady  herself 
continues  to  use  her  maiden  name  after  marriage.  Freud 
mentions  the  case  of  a  lady  who  years  before  her  divorce 
continued  to  use  her  maiden  name  in  signing  documents,  etc. 


214  PSYCHANALYSIS 

(b)  "While  reading  one  day  the  text  recalled  to  me  a  case 
which  I  had  published  years  before.  I  desired  to  make  a 
marginal  note  to  that  effect  when  I  suddenly  found  that 
I  could  not  recall  the  name  of  my  patient.  This  patient 
was  under  my  personal  care  for  months  and  the  features 
ot  the  case  were  such  that  I  had  daily  spent  hours  with 
him,  so  that  it  was  the  more  remarkable  that  I  could  not 
recall  the  name.  As  usual  I  made  a  great  effort  to  recall 
it  and  it  was  only  after  some  time  that  I  thought  of  Freud's 
theories  and  decided  to  test  them  by  analyzing  this  lapse 
of  memory.  The  case  in  question  had  presented  so  many  un- 
usual and  interesting  aspects  that  I  was  advised  to  publish  it. 
After  a  painstaking  preparation  I  was  ready  to  send  it  to 
the  publisher  when  I  was  informed  that  my  senior  had 
decided  to  read  a  paper  on  this  very  subject  before  a 
medical  society  and  that  I  was  to  have  this  paper  ready  for 
him  on  a  certain  date.  My  feelings  on  hearing  this  can 
readily  be  imagined.  The  thought  of  having  labored  for 
days  and  of  some  one  else  getting  the  credit  for  it  caused  me 
indignation  and  depression.  My  colleagues  sympathized 
with  me,  but  all  they  could  do  was  to  make  merry  over  it. 
This  continued  until  the  day  before  the  meeting  when  I 
was  informed  that  owing  to  unforseen  circumstances  I 
was  to  attend  this  meeting  myself  and  read  the  paper. 
I  read  this  paper  as  directed,  but  very  few  of  the  members 
knew  the  true  circumstances  of  the  matter.  Most  of  them 
thought  that  I  was  merely  sent  to  read  the  paper.  The 
reports  of  the  meeting  as  given  in  the  different  medical 
journals  gave  the  name  of  my  senior  as  the  reader  of  the 
paper.  The  reader  will  pardon  my  indulging  in  person- 
alities.    It  is  indispensable  in  psychanalysis  and  here  it 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  215 

serves  to  show  the  marked  displeasure  and  pain  which 
caused  the  repression. 

When  one  attempts  to  follow  Freud's  method  of  "free 
association"  he  soon  finds  himself  in  a  maze.  The  longer 
he  proceeds  the  more  complicated  the  problem  seems  to 
become  and  to  the  inexperienced  it  appears  like  an  endless 
confusion.  Now  and  then  our  thoughts,  as  it  were,  stop. 
We  call  this  an  "obstruction"  or  a  "blocking"  and  experi- 
ence teaches  us  that  this  phenomenon  generally  accom- 
panies or  precedes  some  important  complex.  In  analyz- 
ing psychoneurotic  symptoms  the  patients  often  stop  and 
say  "That's  all.  I  cannot  think  of  anything  else."  After 
considerable  urging  they  finally,  perhaps  after  blushing, 
laughing  or  stammering,  do  think  of  something  else.  Fre- 
quently the  mind  makes  use  of  symbolic  expressions  and 
ambiguous  terms  which  the  physician  must  always  be 
alive  to.  All  these  are  due  to  the  inhibitions  of  the 
psychic  censor  against  the  painful  and  disagreeable 
thoughts. 

On  beginning  to  discover  by  analysis  the  name  of  my 
patient  I  soon  found  myself  in  a  very  complicated  milieu. 
I  distinctly  saw  his  features  in  my  mind.  I  reviewed  all 
the  circumstances  connected  with  the  case  and  noted  all 
my  associations.  Page  after  page  was  filled  and  time 
flew  faster  than  it  seemed.  I  suddenly  found  that  I  had 
spent  five  hours  of  assiduous  application  and  filled  over 
two  dozen  pages,  but  was  seemingly  as  far  from  getting 
the  name  as  when  I  first  started.  Frequently  my  thoughts 
stopped  only  to  start  anew.  I  was  most  desirous  not  only 
of  recalling  the  name,  but  of  testing  Freud's  theory,  as  it 
was  my  first  attempt.     It  would  be  useless  and  impossible. 


216  PSYCHAXALYSIK 

to  recall  the  different  associations,  but  the  following  will 
suffice  to  explain  the  analysis:  On  seeing  the  patient  in 
my  mind's  eye  the  name  Appenzeller  presented  itself  to 
me.  Appenzeller  was  one  of  my  patients  in  the  psychiatri- 
cal clinic  at  Zurich  where  I  was  at  the  time  of  the  analysis. 
There  was  no  resemblance  between  the  two  patients  except 
that  my  New  York  patient  was  a  psychic  epileptic  and 
Appenzeller  suffered  from  motor  epilepsy,  yet  the  latter 
name  persistently  emerged  from  the  association  mass. 
The  scenes  connected  with  my  New  York  patient  as  well 
as  numerous  other  hospital  experiences  continued  to  pass 
in  a  panoramic  review.  Some  were  especially  persistent 
and  vivid,  recurring  with  greater  frequency  than  the  others. 
Thus,  one  scene,  an  actual  occurrence,  was  especially  vivid. 
It  recalled  a  forest  fire  near  the  hospital.  I  stood  watch- 
ing the  fire  with  my  senior,  Dr.  Z.,  who  played  such  a  great 
part  in  the  episode,  and  Dr.  X.  joined  me.  Many  rabbits 
driven  out  by  the  fire  were  shot.  While  thus  standing 
Dr.  Z.  turned  to  a  hospital  attendant  and  asked  him  for 
his  shotgun  as  a  rabbit  was  seen  running  from  the  under- 
brush. He  waited  for  the  animal  to  come  within  range 
and  then  got  ready  to  nre,  remarking: "  Let  me  see  whether 
I  can  get  this  rabbit."  A  crack  was  heard,  but  the  rabbit 
scampered  away.  Dr  X.  and  I  looked  at  each  other 
smilingly,  but  quickly  changed  countenance  when  Dr.  Z. 
turned  to  us  and  said  "  My  finger  slipped  on  account  of 
the  rain."  This  scene  persistently  recurred  from  time  to 
time,  but  I  attached  no  more  weight  to  it  than  to  the  hun- 
dreds of  others.  Yet  whenever  my  supply  of  associations 
seemed  to  be  exhausted  and  I  started  over  again,  the  name 
of  Appenzeller  and  this  scene  continually  reappeared.     I 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  217 

finally  tired  of  the  whole  process  and  thought  of  giving  it 
up,  but  despite  my  willingness  to  do  so  I  could  not  banish 
the  numerous  scenes  from  my  mind.  While  thus  con- 
templating I  again  saw  the  rabbit  scene  and  heard  Dr.  Z. 
say,  "Let  me  see  whether  I  can  get  this  rabbit,"  and  just 
then  the  name  of  the  patient  suddenly  came  to  me.  It 
was  "Lapin"  which  is  the  French  for  rabbit. 

It  can  readily  be  seen  that  had  I  been  keen  enough  it 
would  have  saved  me  hours  of  labor  for  during  the 
analysis  this  scene  occurred  twenty-eight  times  more  than 
any  other.  But  owing  to  my  inexperience  at  the  time 
and  my  intense  desire  to  get  the  name  I  overlooked  the 
very  thing  Freud  lays  so  much  stress  upon — that  is,  the 
symbolic  expressions,  etc.  This  whole  rabbit  scene 
symbolizes  the  Lapin  episode.  Dr.  Z.  attempted  to  get 
the  rabbit  (Lapin)  but  missed  it.  To  be  sure,  it  must  be 
remembered  that  although  I  am  conversant  with  French, 
in  my  mind  Lapin  was  always  translated  into  rabbit 
because  I  think  in  English.  In  fact  I  distinctly  recall 
that  I  had  frequently  translated  mentally  the  name  Lapin 
into  rabbit.  If  we  now  bear  in  mind  the  French  pronuncia- 
tion of  Lapin  we  can  understand  why  Appenzeller  con- 
tinued to  substitute  itself.  The  first  part — Appen — 
phonetically  resembles  Lapin — Appen,  Lapen.  Further- 
more, both  patients  suffered  from  epilepsy.  The  case 
clearly  shows  how  a  name  may  be  repressed  on  account 
of  a  disagreeable  experience. 

(c)  A  colleague  who  was  acquainted  with  Freud's 
theories  asked  me  to  help  him  recall  the  name  of  one  of 
his  patients  whom  he  treated  almost  daily  for  three  months 
up  to  five  weeks  before  he  spoke  to  me.     He  was  thinking 


218  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

of  him  on  his  way  to  see  me  and  was  surprised  to  have 
forgotten  the  name.  Analysis  gave  the  following  associa- 
tions: "He  is  a  broker  who  was  once  well  to  do.  For 
three  months  he  was  under  my  care.  I  cured  him  of  a 
grave  illness.  He  has  not  paid  me  for  treatment,  though 
he  promised  long  ago  to  do  so.  The  last  time  he  came 
to  see  me  he  wanted  me  to  sign  some  papers  for  him  which 
I  refused  to  do  as  I  did  not  care  to  make  any  false  state- 
ments. Since  then  I  have  not  heard  from  him.  It  now 
occurs  to  me  that  the  name  ends  with  'son.'"  He  then 
gave  a  number  of  names  ending  with  "son"  all  of  which 
he  recognized  as  incorrect.  Again  the  patient's  ingrati- 
tude. "When  I  cured  him  he  was  grateful.  He  kept  on 
saying  that  he  would  never  forget  what  I  had  done  for  him 
and  that  as  soon  as  he  returned  to  business  he  would  pay 
me  what  he  owed  me" — sudden  blocking — then  recalled 
his  own  ingratitude.  He,  too,  is  under  obligations  to  a 
distant  relative  whom  he  dislikes,  but  to  whom  he  owes 
much.  He  received  a  letter  six  weeks  before,  requesting 
the  loan  of  a  sum  of  money,  but  after  reading  it  he  mislaid 
it  and  never  thought  of  it  again.  His  relative's  name  is 
Brown — suddenly  recalls  his  former  patient's  name 
"  Bronson." 

Here  the  forgetfulness  was  determined  not  so  much  by 
his  patient's  action  as  by  the  disagreeable  feeling  con- 
nected with  his  own  affair.  He  was  under  obligations  to 
Mr.  Brown.  He  really  should  have  sent  him  the  money 
requested  but  "times  are  bad"  and,  strange  to  say,  he 
mislaid  the  letter  and  never  thought  of  it.  In  this  connec- 
tion it  may  be  mentioned  that  this  is  the  usual  mechanism  of 
mislaying.     Things  which  we  really  value  we  never  mislay. 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  219 

(d)  A  man  was  urged  by  his  wife  to  attend  a  social 
function  in  which  he  not  only  took  no  interest,  but  which 
he  was  sure  would  actually  bore  him.  Yielding  to  his 
wife's  entreaties  he  began  to  take  his  dress  suit  from  the 
trunk  when  he  suddenly  thought  of  shaving.  After 
accomplishing  this  he  returned  to  the  trunk  and  found 
it  locked.  Despite  a  long,  earnest  search,  the  key  could 
not  be  found.  A  locksmith  could  not  be  found  on  Sunday 
evening  so  that  the  couple  had  to  send  their  regrets.  On 
having  the  trunk  opened  the  next  morning  the  lost 
key  was  found  within.  The  husband  had  absentmindedly 
dropped  the  key  into  the  trunk  and  sprung  the  lock.  He 
assured  me  that  this  was  wholly  unintentional  and 
unconscious.  It  must,  however,  be  borne  in  mind  that 
he  did  not  wish  to  go.  There  was  a  motive,  as  we  see,  in 
the  mislaying.  A  lover  never  misplaces  a  letter  from  his 
sweetheart  nor  does  he  ever  mislay  or  forget  to  mail  a 
letter  written  to  her.  We  only  mislay  what  we  do  not 
want.  We  are  more  apt  to  mislay  letters  containing 
bills  than  checks. 

(e)  The  same  mechanism  comes  into  play  in  the 
missending  of  letters.  One  of  my  patients  was  corre- 
sponding with  a  woman  to  whom  he  was  favorably  dis- 
posed. One  day  he  received  a  letter  from  her  which,  on 
opening,  he  found  was  meant  for  another  man  who  was 
also  one  of  her  admirers.  In  this  letter  she  refused  a 
proposal  made  by  the  latter.  The  mistake  served  to 
show  my  patient  that  he  was  not  her  only  admirer  and 
thus  stirred  him  to  greater  activities.  At  the  same  time 
it  showed  the  other  fellow  why  he  was  rejected  as  the 


220  PSYCHANALYSIS 

letter  which  he  receiver!  and  which  was  meant  for  my  patient 
was  a  very  amorous  epistle. 

The  last  two  examples  may  also  be  classified  under  erro- 
neously carried-out  intentions,  another  good  example  of 
which  is  the  following: 

(/)  A  young  married  woman  requested  me  to  explain  to 
her  why,  instead  of  pushing  the  button  to  light  her  room, 
she  pushed  the  button  for  the  waiter.  The  explanation 
was  not  difficult.  This  lady  lived  in  one  of  the  big  hotels 
while  she  was  in  New  York  being  treated  by  me.  The 
afternoon  before  the  episode  she  with  two  other  ladies  went 
to  a  fashionable  public  the  Dansant  and  were  very  disap- 
pointed. After  paying  a  high  admission  fee  they  found  the 
place  almost  deserted  and  no  one  to  dance  with.  One  of 
her  friends  remarked:  "The  waiter  is  the  only  interesting 
person  here."  She  was  not  more  fortunate  the  following 
day.  The  people  she  met  were  uninteresting  and  bored  her. 
It  was  in  this  state  of  mind  that  she  returned  to  the  hotel 
late  in  the  afternoon  and  made  the  mistake  mentioned. 
It  is  significant  that  although  she  started  out  with  the  in- 
tention of  lighting  her  room  she  failed  to  notice  that  her 
room  remained  dark,  and  only  recalled  her  intention  after 
she  was  surprised  by  a  visit  from  the  waiter.  Her  erro- 
neously carried-out  action  had  a  motive — the  "waiter  was  the 
only  interesting  person  to  whom  she  could  talk." 

H.  FORGETTING  A  RESOLUTION  IS  DUE  TO  SIMILAR  CAUSES 

(a)  While  absorbed  in  reading  S.  interrupted  himself, 
opened  a  box  containing  numerous  books,  pamphlets  and 
papers  and  began  to  rummage  through  them.  He  soon 
stopped,  however,  not  knowing  what  he  was  looking  for. 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    E VERY-DAY    LIFE  221 

He  was  sure  that  he  wanted  something  from  the  box, 
but  he  could  not  recall  what  it  was.  He  looked  over 
many  things,  but  did  not  recognize  what  he  wanted.  On 
trying  to  recall  the  motive  for  opening  the  box  he  was 
attracted  by  the  open  book  which  he  left  on  the  table 
and  then  thought  that  there  must  have  been  something 
in  what  he  was  just  reading  which  caused  him  to  open  the 
box.  With  this  in  view  he  began  to  re-read  the  page  and 
plainly  recalled  its  contents  as  far  as  he  had  read,  the  last 
sentence  being,  "We  feel  more  than  we  know."  It  was 
while  thinking  of  this  sentence  that  he  stopped  and 
opened  the  box.  On  freely  associating  to  this  last  sen- 
tence he  obtained  the  following:  "We  feel  more  than  we 
can  ever  know.  I  feel  that  I  ought  to  marry,  but  I  do 
not  know  whether  I  really  should.  I  used  to  feel  that  my 
fiancee  did  not  really  love  me,  but,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  I 
was  not  sure  of  it.  I  worried  much  over  it,  but  it  was 
merely  a  lover's  doubt.  I  am  now  sure  of  her  love.  She 
wants  to  marry  as  soon  as  I  return  and  wishes  to  have  an 
elaborate  church  wedding  which  I  dislike.  But  perhaps 
that  will  not  come  to  pass.  Something  might  happen.  I 
have  recently  read  of  the  stormy  seas.  An  accident 
might  happen  to  me  while  crossing  the  ocean,"  (feeling  of 
fear  and  jealousy)  and  the  thought  "after  all  I  may 
also  be  a  specter  bridegroom"  suddenly  recalled  that 
he  had  been  looking  for  Washington  Irving's  "Sketch 
Book." 

This  incident  occurred  while  S.  was  abroad  and  his 
fiancee  was  in  the  United  States.  While  abroad  he  was 
asked  to  translate  for  a  foreign  periodical  a  short  story 
from    English   literature   and   he   selected   the    Specter 


222  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

Bridegroom  from  Washington  Irving's  "Sketch  Book." 
The  day  before  the  incident  recounted  above  he  had 
received  a  letter  from  the  editor  of  the  Revue  telling  him 
that  under  separate  cover  he  was  sending  the  proof  sheets 
of  the  translation  for  correction.  He  thought  of  looking 
for  the  "Sketch  Book"  which  he  had  in  the  box,  but  failed 
to  do  so  just  then.  It  was  while  unconsciously  ruminat- 
ing over  the  above  cited  sentence  that  the  Specter  Bride- 
groom came  to  his  mind  and  he  set  out  to  find  it,  but  as 
he  unconsciously  identified  himself  with  Count  von  Alten- 
berg,  the  unfortunate  hero  of  Irving's  sketch,  who  was 
killed  while  on  his  way  to  his  bride,  the  painful  thought 
was  quickly  repressed,  taking  with  it  all  the  concomitant 
associations. 

(6)  A  confrere  tells  me  the  following  experience:  He 
started  to  make  a  call  on  a  patient  in  a  certain  street,  but 
instead  of  going  there  he  called  upon  another  patient.  The 
reason  for  this  was  very  simple.  Patient  number  one 
paid  his  bill  every  January,  while  patient  number  two 
paid  for  each  visit.  That  morning  the  doctor  was  in 
need  of  money,  hence  he  would  have  preferred  to  go  to 
patient  number  two. 

(c)  One  of  my  patients,  a  music  teacher,  told  me  a 
similar  experience.  On  going  to  see  a  pupil  in  New  York 
City  he  unexpectedly  landed  in  Brooklyn.  The  music 
teacher  carried  on  a  secret  love  affair  with  his  pupil's  sister, 
and  was  accustomed  to  see  her  every  evening  after  the 
lesson.  He  usually  gave  the  lesson  in  the  evening,  but 
this  time  he  was  told  to  come  in  the  morning.  He  knew 
well  that  he  would  not  see  her  in  the  morning  because  she 
would  be  at  work,  but  he  did  not  like  to  refuse  lest  it  might 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  223 

arouse  suspicion.  On  going  to  give  the  lesson  he  simply 
rode  too  far,  "having  been  absorbed  in  his  newspaper." 
As  it  was  too  late  to  return  from  Brooklyn  and  give  the 
lesson  in  the  morning  he  was  forced  to  postpone  it  till  the 
evening.  He  assured  me  that  he  really  intended  to  go  to 
his  pupil's  house. 

(d)  Another  patient  invited  two  ladies  to  spend  an 
evening  at  the  theater.  It  was  decided  by  the  ladies  to 
see  the  play  "Alias  Jimmy  Valentine."  On  getting  into 
the  cab  he  unconsciously  ordered  the  driver  to  take  them 
to  another  theater  and  did  not  notice  his  mistake  until 
they  arrived  at  the  wrong  theater.  Then  it  was  too  late 
to  rectify  it.  Here  it  was  the  case  of  a  homosexual  person 
who  was  in  constant  fear  of  the  law  and  who  disliked  to 
see  a  play  dealing  with  convicts  and  prisons.  The  theater 
to  which  he  ordered  the  driver  to  take  him  presented  the 
play  "The  Three  Daughters  of  Mons.  Dupont,"  which 
deals  with  a  selfish  father  who  was  finally  brought  to 
reason  by  his  own  children.  He  disliked  his  own  father 
and  was  constantly  trying  to  show  him  how  to  live  prop- 
erly. His  mistakes  served  to  exchange  a  disagreeable 
for  an  enjoyable  evening. 

These  examples  show  that  forgetting  a  resolution  is 
exactly  the  same  as  forgetting  to  recall  a  name  or  word 
— that  is,  it  is  always  determined  by  a  painful  motive. 

m.  MISTAKES    IN    SPEAKING,    READING    AND    WRITING 

Mistakes  in  speaking  show  a  similar  mechanism.  The 
disturbing  influence  is  either  a  single  unconsciously  re- 
maining thought  which  manifests  itself  through  the  mis- 
take and  can  often  be  discovered  only  after  detailed  analy- 


224  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

sis,  or  it  is  a  general  psychic  motive  directed  against  the 
whole  thing  spoken. 

(a)  At  a  private  theatrical  rehearsal  the  hero,  instead 
of  saying  "I  love  you,  Emma,"  said  "I  love  you,  Helen." 
The  latter  was  the  name  of  the  girl  with  whom  he  was 
really  in  love. 

(b)  Recently  an  acquaintance  asked  me  to  introduce  him 
to  one  of  my  friends  who  was  about  to  leave  for  Europe.  I 
did  not  like  to  do  it,  but  I  could  not  possibly  refuse. 
After  hesitating  for  awhile  I  said  "Come  around  next 
Sunday  and  I'll  take  you  to  his  office."  My  wife,  who  was 
near,  interposed  with  "Why,  he  sails  Saturday."  I 
immediately  corrected  myself,  saying  "I  meant  Friday." 
Here  the  mistake  was  the  answer  to  the  thought,  "I 
wonder  how  I  can  avoid  this."  Fortunately  my  acquaint- 
ance knew  nothing  of  Freud's  mechanisms. 

(c)  A  lady,  talking  about  her  husband  with  whom  she 
lived  a  very  unhappy  life  because  he  was  addicted  to 
drink,  said  among  other  things,  "  I  can  never  discuss  with 
him  any  intelligent  topic  because  he  is  so  full,"  meaning 
"dull." 

(d)  A  friend  described  to  me  a  nervous  patient  and 
wished  me  to  know  whether  I  could  benefit  him.  I  re- 
marked "I  believe  that  in  time  I  could  remove  all  his 
symptoms  by  psychanalysis  because  it  is  a  durable  case," 
wishing  to  say  "curable."  It  was  not  merely  the  sound 
association  between  the  two  words  which  caused  the  mis- 
take. From  the  description  I  diagnosed  the  case  as  chronic 
hysteria  and  experience  teaches  that  such  cases  generally 
require  a  very  protracted  treatment,  hence  durable. 

(e)  A  young  man,  talking  about  an  old  woman  who  was 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  225 

foolishly  in  love  with  him,  said  "I  am  thinking  seriously 
of  burying  her"  instead  of  marrying.  Here  the  lapsus 
linguae  betrays  his  inner  feelings  in  the  matter.  He  would 
marry  this  old  and  wealthy  woman  if  he  should  know  that 
she  would  soon  die  and  leave  him  her  money. 

(/)  A  woman  wishing  to  say  that  her  brother  had  recently 
lost  in  weight  and  that  he  weighed  only  175  pounds,  said: 
"And  now  he  weighs  only  $1.75."  The  slip  becomes  clear 
when  we  know  that  her  brother  was  at  the  time  being  tried 
for  bankruptcy. 

(g)  While  walking  one  night  with  a  friend  we  acci- 
dentally met  a  colleague,  Dr.  P.  whom  I  had  not  seen  for 
years  and  of  whose  private  life  I  knew  nothing.  We  were 
naturally  very  pleased  to  meet  again  and  on  my  invitation 
he  accompanied  us  to  a  cafe*  where  we  spent  about  two 
hours  in  pleasant  conversation.  To  my  question  as  to 
whether  he  was  married  he  gave  a  negative  answer  and 
added,  "Why  should  a  man  like  me  marry?" 

On  leaving  the  cafe  he  suddenly  turned  to  me  and  said : 
"I  should  like  to  know  what  you  would  do  in  a  case  like 
this.  I  know  a  nurse  who  was  named  as  co-respondent 
in  a  divorce  case.  The  wife  sued  the  husband  for  divorce 
and  named  her  as  co-respondent  and  he  got  the  divorce." 
I  interrupted  him  saying  "You  mean  she  got  the  divorce." 
He  immediately  corrected  himself,  saying,  "Yes,  she  got 
the  divorce"  and  continued  to  tell  how  the  excitement  of 
the  trial  had  affected  this  nurse  to  such  an  extent  that  she 
became  nervous  and  took  to  drink.  He  wanted  me  to  ad- 
vise him  how  to  treat  her,  etc. 

As  soon  as  I  corrected  his  mistake  I  asked  him  to  explain 

it,  but,  as  is  usually  the  case,  he  was  surprised  at  my  ques- 
ts 


226  PSYCHANALYSI8 

tion.  He  wanted  to  know  whether  a  person  had  no  right 
to  make  mistakes  in  talking.  I  explained  to  him  that 
there  is  a  reason  for  every  mistake  and  that  if  he  had  not 
told  me  that  he  was  unmarried  I  would  say  that  he  was  the 
hero  of  the  divorce  case  in  question  and  that  the  mistake 
showed  that  he  wished  he  had  obtained  the  divorce 
instead  of  his  wife;  so  as  not  to  be  obliged  to  pay  the 
alimony  and  to  be  permitted  to  marry  again  in  New 
York  City.  He  stoutly  denied  my  interpretation,  but 
his  emotional  agitation,  followed  by  loud  laughter,  only 
strengthened  my  suspicions.  To  my  appeal  that  he 
should  tell  the  truth  for  science  sake,  he  said  "Unless 
you  wish  me  to  lie  you  must  believe  that  I  was  never 
married  and  hence  your  psychanalytic  interpretation  is 
all  wrong."  He,  however,  added  that  it  was  dangerous 
to  be  with  a  person  who  paid  attention  to  such  little 
things.  Then  he  suddenly  remembered  that  he  had 
another  appointment  and  left  us. 

Both  my  friend  and  I  were  convinced  that  my  inter- 
pretation of  his  lapsus  linguae  was  correct  and  I  decided 
to  corroborate  or  disprove  it  by  further  investigation. 
The  next  day  I  found  a  neighbor,  an  old  friend  of  Dr.  P., 
who  confirmed  my  interpretation  in  every  particular. 
The  divorce  was  granted  to  Dr.  P.'s  wife  a  few  weeks 
before  and  a  nurse  was  named  as  co-respondent.  A 
few  weeks  later  I  met  Dr.  P.  and  he  told  me  that  he  was 
thoroughly  convinced  of  the  Freudian  mechanisms. 

(h)  A  homosexual  whom  I  treated  for  some  time  and 
who  considered  himself  cured  made  this  mistake  on 
leaving  my  office:  instead  of  saying  "I  shall  now  go  to 
the  Hotel  Robespierre"  he  said,  "I  shall   now  go  to  the 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  227 

Hotel  St.  Pierre."  I  noticed  his  mistake  and  asked  him 
whether  he  knew  of  a  hotel  in  New  York  City  by  the  name 
of  St.  Pierre.  He  stated  that  he  had  never  heard  of  a 
hotel  named  the  St.  Pierre  and  that  he  meant  to  say  the 
Hotel  Robespierre. 

The  analysis  furnished  the  following  associations: 
"St.  Pierre — St.  Peter — Rome; — adoration," — he  recalled 
having  seen  the  devout  kiss  the  toe  of  St.  Peter  while  he 
was  in  the  Cathedral  at  Rome — from  Rome  he  went  to 
Pompei  where  he  saw  some  remnants  of  the  old  phallic 
worship — the  big  toe  recalled  one  of  his  phallic  symbols 
(as  a  child  he  was  a  toe  sucker) — he  then  thought  of  fellatio 
which,  he  said,  no  longer  had  any  attraction  for  him  as 
he  was  now  heterosexual  and  very  pleased  over  it — he 
then  stopped  and  again  thought  of  St.  Peter  and  Rome  and 
said:  "They  stand  for  the  old  order  of  things,  strict  adher- 
ence to  the  old  orthodox  religion — they  are  against  all 
reforms — Robespierre  reminds  me  of  revolution,  complete 
change  of  the  order  of  things,  including  religion — they 
stopped  worshipping  Christ  and  worshipped  instead  the 
Goddess  of  Reason,  a  woman  of  questionable  reputation." 

His  stock  of  associations  was  exhausted  and  I  did  not 
urge  him  to  continue  as  I  could  now  interpret  his  mistake 
in  speaking.  When  he  was  about  to  leave  my  office  he 
intended  to  visit  his  mistress  who  lived  in  the  Hotel 
Robespierre.  His  mistake  showed  his  unconscious  resist- 
ance against  heterosexuality.  He  would  still  prefer  to 
cling  to  the  "old  order  of  things,"  of  worshipping  the  man 
rather  than  the  woman. 

(i)  My  traveling  companion,  who  for  some  reason,  took 
particular   pleasure  in  railing  at  the  medical    profession, 


228  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

remarked  once,  "The  most  appropriate  name  for  a  doctor 
I  ever  heard  of  I  read  in  this  morning's  Sun.  It  was  Dr. 
Slayers,  etc."  I  became  interested  and  asked  him  to 
show  me  the  article  and  to  his  surprise  the  name  was  not 
Slayers,  but  Salyers.  Here  his  unconscious  thought 
"Doctors  are  butchers"  took  advantage  of  the  close 
similarity  of  the  words  and  caused  this  metathesis. 

(J)  A  young  bride  who  was  obliged  to  remain  at  home 
on  Sunday  morning  and  transcribe  her  husband's  manu- 
script instead  of  attending  church,  as  was  her  custom, 
wrote  Bridle  March  instead  of  Bridal  March  and  parson 
instead  of  person. 

(k)  On  re-reading  an  abstract  which  I  made  from  a 
foreign  journal  I  was  surprised  to  find  that  instead  of 
writing  "Markuse  even  went  so  far  as  to  recommend 
sexual  intercourse  as  a  therapeutic  agent  for  unmarried 
women"  I  wrote  "the  great  Markuse,  etc."  I  then  re- 
called that  while  reading  about  Markuse's  very  bold 
recommendation  I  was  most  surprised  and  said  to  myself 
"Such  courage  could  only  be  evinced  by  either  a  very 
great  or  an  eccentric  man"  and  knowing  the  scientific 
attainments  of  Markuse  I  readily  eliminated  the  second 
part  of  the  postulate.  Having  decided  that  he  was  a 
great  man  my  unconscious  thought  found  it  easy  to  pro- 
duce by  metathesis  from  Markuse  the  Greek  word 
Makros  (long,  big,  great). 

Mistakes  in  printing  are  of  a  similar  nature.  As  a 
classical  example  of  this  type  may  be  cited  the  "Wicked 
Bible"  so-called  from  the  fact  that  the  negative  was  left 
out  of  the  Seventh  Commandment.  This  authorized 
edition  of  the  Bible  was  published  in  London  in  1631 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  229 

and  it  is  said  that  the  printer  had  to  pay  a  fine  of  two 
thousand  pounds  for  the  ommission. 

IV.  SYMBOLIC  ACTIONS 

Symbolic  actions,  according  to  Freud,  are  those  per- 
formances which  a  person  does  unconsciously  and  auto- 
matically and  which  he  considers  as  meaningless,  indiffer- 
ent and  accidental  when  his  attention  is  called  to  them. 
Such  actions,  depending  on  their  determinations,  are 
either  simple  or  complicated  and  manifest  themselves  in 
either  such  insignificant  acts  as  scribbling  aimlessly 
with  one's  lead  pencil,  jingling  the  coins  in  one's  pocket, 
kneading  of  soft  substances,  etc.,  or  in  more  complicated 
acts.  All  such  performances  generally  conceal  sense  and 
meaning  for  which  any  other  outlet  is  closed. 

Symbolic  or  accidental  actions  can  be  observed  both 
among  normal  and  abnormal  persons.  They  are  of 
special  interest  to  the  doctor  who  finds  many  valuable 
hints  for  the  interpretation  of  symptoms  and  to  the 
student  of  human  nature  to  whom  they  tell  volumes. 
The  popular  saying  "actions  speak  louder  than  words" 
is  especially  true  of  the  manifestly  insignificant  and 
accidental  ones.  Such  actions  often  refer  to  a  person's 
complexes,  which  show  a  tendency  to  become  split  off  from 
consciousness  and  repressed  into  the  unconscious.  We 
are  wont  to  look  at  everything  under  the  guise  of  a  par- 
ticular complex.  Thus  the  misreading  of  Slayer  for 
Salyer  is  an  example  of  complex  constellation.  This 
gentleman  had  some  unpleasant  experiences  with  a 
doctor,  hence  the  misreading  is  merely  a  symbolic  expres- 
sion of  his  repressed  complex.     Such  complex  symbols 


230  PSYCHANALYSIS 

are  expressed  in  peculiar  complicated  acts.  Jung  cites 
the  case  of  a  young  lady  who  "when  promenading  wished 
to  take  along  a  baby  carriage.  The  reason  for  this,  as 
she  blushingly  admitted,  was  because  she  desired  to  be 
looked  upon  as  married.  I  know  an  old  maid  who 
wears  a  wedding  ring,  especially  when  traveling.  Her 
reason  for  wearing  it  is  "  because  it  was  my  grandmother's. 
Other  examples  of  symbolic  actions  are  the  following : 

(a)  A  woman  song  writer  and  poet  who  led  a  very 
unhappy  life  continued  to  write  on  the  happiness  of  matri- 
mony and  just  before  she  obtained  a  divorce  she  gave  out 
a  song  entitled  "How  to  Keep  a  Husband."  Another 
writer  on  "The  Home  Beautiful"  recently  asked  the  court 
to  divorce  her  from  her  husband. 

(b)  A  noted  artist  and  writer  of  sonnets  on  the  happiness 
of  perfect  marriage  forsook  his  first  wife  for  an  affinity, 
maltreated  his  second  wife,  for  which  he  was  arrested  and 
punished,  and  now  that  he  is  finally  divorced,  he  is  going 
through  similar  experiences  with  a  third  wife. 

(c)  The  patient  mentioned  before,  while  despairing  of 
his  life  because  he  imagined  himself  afflicted  with  an 
incurable  disease,  continued  to  occupy  himself  with 
Ibsen's  "When  We  Dead  Awaken." 

(d)  A  New  York  embezzler  who  was  discovered  by 
detectives  in  a  Philadelphia  public  library  was  found 
reading  a  book  entitled  "Will  I  ever  go  Back?" 

(e)  The  selection  of  Washington  Irving's  Spectre  Bride- 
groom for  translation  in  the  aforementioned  example  is 
another  symbolic  action  of  this  kind.  Names  of  com- 
mercial houses  and  institutions  often  betray  similar  median- 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    E VERY-DAY    LIFE  231 

isms.  Thus,  Sesrun  and  Yvel  mentioned  above  belong  to 
this  type.  Similar  examples  are  the  following:  A  hotel  for 
colored  people  at  a  neighboring  summer  resort  bears  the 
significant  name  of  "The  White  Isle."  The  home  for  the 
blind  is  named  "The  Light  House,"  and  our  street-cleaners 
are  called  "White  Wings."  Selections  of  certain  profes- 
sions are  usually  symbolic  actions.  Thus,  I  know  an  actress 
and  a  lawyer  who  are  very  bad  stutterers:  here  the  pro- 
fessions serve  to  conceal  the  real  defect,  for  no  one  would  ever 
think  that  an  actress  or  a  lawyer  could  lack  the  most  essen- 
tial requirement  of  their  callings.  It  is  said  that  our  blind 
senator  greets  people  with  the  stereotyped  expression,  "Glad 
to  see  you,"  and  always  holds  some  note-paper  in  his  hands 
while  addressing  an  audience. 

When  I  became  interested  in  this  question  I  asked  some 
of  my  confreres  how  they  came  to  study  medicine  and  I 
received  very  interesting  answers  of  which  I  will  mention 
two.  Dr.  W.  stated  that  since  his  early  youth  he  thought 
of  studying  medicine.  As  an  infant,  he  became  afflicted 
with  infantile  paralysis,  the  effects  of  which  he  still  shows, 
and  as  the  doctors  could  not  help  him  he  thought  of 
finding  a  cure  himself.  Dr.  B.  could  give  no  definite 
reason,  but  finally  recalled  that  when  he  was  very  young 
he  overheard  a  conversation  between  his  mother  and 
another  woman.  The  latter  asked  his  mother  in  what 
month  he  was  born  and  on  being  told  that  it  was  October 
she  dryly  remarked  "He  will  be  either  a  doctor,  a  butcher 
or  a  murderer.  He  will  have  to  shed  blood."  As  he 
did  not  care  to  adopt  the  last  two  professions  he  became  a 
doctor.     Some  may  think  that  the  compromise  includes 


232  PSYCHANALYSIS 

thorn  all.  I  can  definitely  assert  that  in  this  case  it  was 
an  unconscious  process.* 

It  is  interesting  to  see  what  part  such  symbolic  actions 
play  in  every-day  life. 

(a)  A  young  married  woman  asked  her  husband  for 
money  to  make  some  purchases  on  their  way  home. 
While  talking  she  suddenly  threw  away  the  ten  dollar 
bill  as  though  it  were  a  valueless  piece  of  paper.  Her 
husband  noticed  it  and  picked  it  up  without  her  perceiving 
it.  Not  until  she  reached  the  store  did  she  notice  that 
she  had  lost  the  bill.  This  woman  was  wont  to  con- 
tribute ten  dollars  monthly  to  a  charitable  society  before 
her  marriage.  While  promenading  she  spoke  to  her 
husband  about  it  and  he  said  that  it  would  be  best  to 
stop  it  for  the  time  being,  to  which  she  had  to  acquiesce. 
It  was  after  this  conversation  that  she  threw  away  the 
bill.  This  action  was  the  equivalent  of  the  thought 
"You  do  not  allow  me  to  give  it  to  charity  so  I  throw  it 
away  so  that  some  poor  person  may  find  it."  That  is, 
it  was  meant  as  a  sacrifice. 

(6)  A  woman  continued  to  oversalt  everything  she 
cooked  for  her  husband.  At  the  same  time  she  persis- 
tently forgot  to  place  salt  on  the  table.  By  this  she 
meant  to  express  "I  am  in  love,  but  you  are  not."  For 
it  is  said  that  when  a  woman  is  in  love  she  oversalts  the 
food.  In  fact  she  always  talked  of  her  husband's  indiffer- 
ences and  her  ardent  love. 

Some  symbolic  actions  continue  to  manifest  themselves 

*  For  other  unconscious  motives  underlying  the  selection  of  certain 
vocations,  sec  my  remarks  in  Vol.  VIII,  No.  5,  p.  341,  of  the  Journal  of 
Abnormal  Psychology. 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  233 

for  long  periods,  sometimes  for  life,  and  are  considered 
personal  characteristics  of  the  individual  evincing  them. 
Such  activities  are  very  often  only  reactions  of  some  re- 
pressed impulses  and  are  either  the  symbolic  expressions 
of  the  repressed  wishes  or  represent  contrasts  of  the  same. 
A  good  example  of  the  last  type  is  the  woman  mentioned 
before  who  insisted  upon  paying  cash  for  everything. 
Another  example  of  this  kind  was  a  young  man  of  twenty- 
eight  years  who  was  very  religious  and  over-scrupulous  in 
everything.  In  fact  his  relatives  and  intimate  friends  con- 
sidered him  "a  bit  too  religious  and  over-conscientious." 
Examination  showed  that  his  outward  expression  of 
piety  and  conscientiousness  was  a  contrast  manifestation 
of  his  unconscious.  For  years  he  had  been  struggling 
with  sexual  temptations.  He  saw  sex  where  no  one  else 
did.  He  went  through  the  usual  conflicts  of  the  mastur- 
bator,  the  struggles  against  illicit  sex  and  finally  thought 
he  was  victorious.  For  two  years  before  he  came  to  me, 
he  led  what  he  called  "a  pure  life."  He  shunned  the 
society  of  women  and  his  moral  sensitiveness  verged  on 
eccentricity.  A  few  examples  obtained  from  himself 
will  show  his  personality.  When  a  woman  addressed 
him  and  asked  to  be  directed  to  a  certain  street  he  turned 
his  head  away  from  her  fearing  that  she  might  arouse 
sex  fancies.  He  was  once  present  at  a  social  gathering 
at  which  a  dispute  arose  between  a  young  man  and  a 
young  woman  as  to  who  was  the  taller  of  the  two.  To 
settle  this  they  stood  back  to  back  and  asked  the  others 
to  express  judgment.  He  became  excited  over  this  and 
left  the  room.  He  thought  that  their  action  was  immoral. 
Yet  while  he  was  an  ardent  member  of  the  church  and 


234  PSYCHANALYSIS 

was  held  up  as  a  model  young  man  he  spent  hours  in 
disreputable  neighborhoods.  In  fact  his  time  was  divided 
between  the  church  and  the  slums.  To  be  sure  his  object 
in  frequenting  these  places  was  "to  do  good."  He 
wished  "to  eradicate  the  canker  that  eats  its  way  into 
innocent  minds."  To  effect  this  he  would  allow  himself 
to  be  accosted  by  prostitutes  and  then  have  them  arrested. 
On  a  few  occasions  he  really  yielded  to  temptation  which 
naturally  increased  his  zeal  for  "eradicating  the  canker." 
In  reality,  however,  he  did  all  these  things  because  he 
unconsciously  desired  them  and  his  every-day  piety  was 
a  symbolic  contrast  expression. 

Symbolic  actions  of  long  duration  which  are  the  direct 
results  of  repressed  wishes  furnish  a  wide  field  for  collect- 
ing-manias or  peculiar  hobbies.  I  do  not  refer  to  those 
who  confine  then*  activities  to  the  collection  of  valuable 
or  scientific  objects  such  as  books,  paintings,  etc.,  but 
I  mean  those  persons  who  collect  things  without  any 
definite  aim,  who  can  give  no  reason  for  their  activity 
and  whose  collections  as  such  are  of  no  scientific  value. 
I  can  best  explain  what  I  mean  by  giving  the  following 
examples: 

(a)  An  unmarried  woman  of  thirty-six  years  took  a 
great  interest  in  mushrooms.  She  not  only  took  her 
vacation  during  the  mushroom  season  so  as  to  be  able 
to  study  and  gather  them,  but  she  also  collected  many 
works  on  the  subject,  especially  those  containing  colored 
charts.  She  had  no  scientific  interest  in  the  subject  and 
could  give  no  reason  for  her  action.  She  only  knew 
that  mushrooms  fascinated  her.  Analysis  showed  that 
she  began  to  take  an  interest  in  mushrooms  a  few  years 


PSTCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  235 

before  while  she  was  on  her  vacation.  She  passed  a 
restless  night,  having  been  troubled  by  many  nightmares. 
While  taking  a  walk  early  in  the  morning  she  found  some 
mushrooms.  This  was  the  beginning  of  her  interest  in 
mushrooms.  Further  investigation  showed  that  at  the 
time  she  resisted  many  sexual  temptations  which  would 
also  account  for  her  insomnia  and  nightmares.2  The 
interest  for  mushrooms  was  aroused  by  their  resemblance 
to  the  penis.  Phallus  is  the  scientific  name  for  some 
species  of  mushrooms. 

(b)  Some  years  ago  while  traveling  in  Europe  I  hap- 
pened to  be  in  the  same  railroad  compartment  with  a 
western  gentleman.  He  was  a  hail-fellow-well-met  so 
we  soon  became  acquainted.  He  was  a  man  of  means 
who  was  traveling  for  his  health  and  discovering  that 
I  was  a  physician  he  soon  became  confidential.  He  told 
me  that  he  was  suffering  from  a  nervous  disease  and 
asked  me  to  recommend  him  some  professor  in  Paris. 
We  were  together  for  about  twelve  hours  and  as  we  had 
to  pass  two  boundary  lines  I  noticed  that  he  carried  with 
him  a  small  suit  case  which  he  guarded  very  carefully. 
It  was  filled  with  stick-pins  of  all  descriptions  which  he 
bought  as  souvenirs  in  every  European  city  of  importance. 
To  my  remark  that  he  must  have  a  great  many  very  good 
friends  to  buy  for  them  so  many  stickpins  he  replied 
that  they  were  not  meant  to  be  given  away.  He  stated 
that  he  would  not  be  foolish  enough  to  give  away  so 
many  valuable  presents,  but  that  he  collected  them  for 
his  pleasure.  "Some  people,"  he  said,  "when  they 
travel  collect  pictures.  I  made  up  my  mind  to  collect 
stickpins."     He  did  not  know  just  why  he  collected  them. 


23G  PSYCHANALYSIS 

"I  bought  a  few  for  myself,"  he  said,  "and  then  I  just 
kept  it  up." 

As  I  said  before  the  man  came  to  Europe  to  seek  relief 
from  a  nervous  trouble.  When  he  asked  me  to  recom- 
mend him  some  professor  I  was  compelled  to  ask  him  to 
explain  his  ailment  as  I  could  not  see  anything  organic- 
ally wrong  with  him.  He  then  told  me  that  he  has  been 
suffering  for  years  from  psychic  impotence  and  that  he 
had  consulted  many  specialists  in  the  United  States 
without  obtaining  any  relief  and  that  he  met  with  no 
better  success  in  Europe.  He  described  his  malady  in 
the  following  words:  "I  have  the  desire,  and  I  have  erec- 
tions when  I  am  alone,  and  sometimes  I  can  even  have 
an  erection  when  I  am  with  a  woman,  but  I  can't  stick  it 
in.  When  I  try  this  the  erection  fades."  May  we  not 
assume  that  his  collection  of  stick-pins  was  an  unconscious 
activity  to  get  that  which  he  most  desired  in  reality? 

In  this  connection  the  following  letter  will  be  of  interest; 
it  was  sent  to  me  by  a  gentleman  with  permission  for  publica- 
tion after  he  read  the  first  edition  of  this  book : 

"Dear  Doctor  Brill: 

"The  fascinating  habit  of  making  odd  collections  becomes  signifi- 
cant to  one's  mind  after  reading  in  your  book  about  the  man  who  col- 
lected stick-pins.  While  you  are  making  a  collection  of  collections  you 
may  care  to  have  an  odd  one — a  true  tale  from  pioneer  days  of  Indiana. 
"My  grandfather  (1813-1896)  was  born  and  reared  a  strict  Scotch 
Presbyterian  and  played  the  part  all  his  life.  According  to  his  own  word 
— whispered  to  a  few  in  the  old  days — he  was  quite  a  boy  among  the 
girls  and  sewed  some  wild  oats.  He  reared  a  family  of  nine,  was  a  strict 
disciplinarian,  a  regular  churchman,  thrifty,  active,  a  good  farmer 
and  horse-trader,  and  lived  well.  He  was  also  known  as  a  man  of 
pronounced  amorous  tendencies.  Even  after  he  was  seventy  years  old 
he  worried  his  old  rheumatic  wife  with  his  youthful  actions  until  she 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  237 

fairly  cried  out.  After  her  death  he  began  to  visit  some  "white-trash" 
family  where  there  was  a  girl  who  received  men  for  compensation.  He 
intended  to  move  this  family  on  his  farm,  when  his  son  H.  got  "wind" 
of  it  and  set  fire  to  the  log  cabin.  He  married  a  second  time  a  few  years 
before  his  death  a  well-preserved  woman  of  nearly  seventy  years. 
This  did  not  prevent  him  from  fondling  the  breasts  of  the  hired  girls 
whenever  he  was  able  to  do  so. 

"When  the  old  home  was  broken  up  and  grandfather  left  the  old  place 
to  his  sons,  they  found  tons  of  horseshoes  about  the  old  shop.  As  a 
child  I  looked  upon  that  old  shop  and  the  collection  of  horseshoes  with 
wonder.  Grandfather  would  pick  up  horseshoes  everywhere  in  the 
public  road,  and  even  when  found  on  strange  farms.  He  was  never 
known  to  sell  them,  and  had  thousands  safely  stored  in  the  garret. 

"Did  every  horseshoe  represent  one  or  more  thoughts  of  a  lady's 
'seat  of  love'  to  this  dear  old  Scotch  churchman?" 

Whether  our  correspondent's  question  can  be  answered 
negatively  or  affirmatively  must  remain  open,  but  there  are 
many  points  in  the  case  favoring  the  assumption  that  this 
collecting  mania  was  a  symbolic  action  on  the  part  of  the  old 
gentleman.  He  unconsciously  collected  what  he  desired  so 
much  in  reality. 

/Those  who  object  to  this  analysis  as  being  far-fetched,  argu- 
ing that  the  horseshoe  is  a  well-known  popular  talisman  for 
good  luck,  may  be  reminded  of  the  origin  of  this  popular  belief. 
Inman3  states:  "It  was  the  universal  practice  among  the 
Arabs  of  northern  Africa  to  stick  up  over  the  door  of  their 
houses  or  tents  the  genital  parts  of  a  cow,  mare  or  female 
camel,  as  a  talisman  to  avert  the  influence  of  the  evil  eye. 
The  figure  of  this  organ  being  less  definite  than  that  of  the 
male,  it  has  assumed  in  symbolism  very  various  forms.  The 
commonest  substitution  for  the  part  itself  has  been  a  horse- 
shoe, which  is  to  this  day  fastened  over  many  of  the  doors 
of  stables  and  shippons  in  the  country,  and  was  formerly 
supposed  to  protect  the  cattle  from  witchcraft." 


238  PSYCHANALY8IS 

Other  collecting  manias  that  came  to  ray  notice  were  those 
of  three  men  who  collected  very  old  furniture.  As  far  as  I 
could  discover  there  was  no  special  object  in  these  collec- 
tions; the  old  furniture  was  bought  and  stored  away. 
These  three  collectors  were  old  bachelors  who  were  strongly 
attached  to  their  mother  ideals;  they  all  lived  in  the  past 
and  never  expected  to  marry. 

Some  of  the  collections  reported  to  me  were  extremely 
bizarre.  Thus,  I  heard  of  a  very  intelligent  man  who  col- 
lected the  cheap  collar  buttons  one  finds  in  laundered  shirts. 
He  asked  his  friends  to  save  those  buttons  for  him,  and  I 
was  told  that  he  is  the  happy  possessor  of  many  boxes  filled 
with  such  collar  buttons.  Another  man  is  collecting  corks. 
He  is  supposed  to  possess  many  thousands,  which  he  guards 
very  jealously.  A  young  girl  of  seventeen  years  is  an 
ardent  collector  of  candlesticks.  An  elderly  woman  sud- 
denly decided  a  few  years  ago  to  collect  pocketbooks;  she 
possesses  hundreds  of  pocketbooks  from  which  she  would 
not  part.  My  informer  tells  me  that  this  woman  could 
offer  no  explanation  for  her  strange  collecting  activity.  A 
similar  case  of  a  woman  who  collects  pitchers  was  recently 
reported  in  the  New  York  Times,  under  the  title  of  "In  the 
House  of  the  Thousand  Pitchers." 

Collectors  of  the  type  here  described  are  not  indigenous 
to  our  own  age;  it  seems  that  they  have  alwrays  existed. 
Pelman,4  who  devotes  some  space  to  the  subject,  reports 
many  odd  cases  of  which  I  shall  mention  the  following: 

A  naval  officer  collected  uniform  buttons ;  a  man  collected 
corkscrews  for  thirty  years;  the  obstetrician  Braun  collected 
pubic  hair,  which  he  skilfully  acquired  while  examining  his 
patients.    The  most  curious  collection  was  left  by  Countess 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  239 

Chavan  Narischkin.  It  consisted  of  a  great  many  bed-pans 
belonging  to  historical  characters,  for  which  she  paid  fabu- 
lous sums.  Among  the  bed-pans  of  her  collection  were  those 
of  Ann  of  Austria,  Diana  of  Poitiers,  Mary  Stuart,  Marie 
Antoinette,  Pompadour,  Dubarry,  Catherine  II  of  Russia 
and  many  others. 

The  meaning  of  such  collecting  manias  is  often  apparent; 
there  is  no  doubt  that  they  are  all  symbolic  actions.  The 
collecting  mania  is  an  activity  motivated  by  the  uncon- 
scious. It  is  a  reaction  to  an  inner  feeling  of  voidness  con- 
cerning some  particular  craving.  This  is  best  seen  among 
the  insane,  who  often  show  the  collecting  mania  in  a  very 
pronounced  form.  Those  who  are  actively  engaged  in  the 
practice  of  psychiatry  know  how  troublesome  such  patients 
are.  They  constantly  fill  their  pockets,  the  lining  of  their 
clothes  with  rubbish  of  all  descriptions.  They  have  to  be 
searched  from  day  to  day,  otherwise  they  accumulate  heaps 
of  rubbish,  and  they  act  like  children  whose  toys  are  taken 
away  when  they  are  deprived  of  these  senseless  collections. 
When  they  are  at  home  they  often  fill  whole  rooms  with 
pieces  of  paper,  glass,  stones,  rags  and  similar  useless 
objects.  The  last  few  cases  observed  by  me  showing  such  a 
collecting  mania  were  all  controlled  by  delusions  of  poverty. 
One  of  these  patients,  a  woman  of  means,  collected  such 
rubbish  and  locked  it  up  in  her  safe.  When  I  asked  her  why 
she  collected  all  these  things,  she  said:  "Every  little  thing 
counts."  The  mental  deterioration  in  such  patients  blurs 
their  sense  of  value,  and  they  thus  blindly  follow  the  im- 
pulse. This  impulse  may  be  a  reaction  to  delusions  of  pov- 
erty, or  an  expression  of  insatiableness  found  in  children 
which  one  often  finds  in  mentally  deteriorated  patients. 


240  PSYCHANALYSIS 

Music,  too,  is  used  to  give  expression  to  one's  complexes. 
While  doing  some  experimental  work  in  the  same  labora- 
tory with  Dr.  L.  he  continued  to  whistle  for  hours  an 
old  melody.  It  was  the  refrain  from  the  old  song  "Don't 
Be  Angry,  that  Cannot  be."  Having  been  acquainted 
with  the  contents  of  this  song  I  wondered  whether  his 
mechanical  whistling  expressed  the  feeling  of  a  rejected 
love.  On  asking  him  why  he  whistled  so  much  he  char- 
acteristically replied  "I  don't  know  myself."  I  then 
asked  him  whether  he  knew  what  he  was  whistling,  but 
be  assured  me  that  he  did  not.  "It  is  some  street  song," 
he  said.  "I  have  a  habit  of  whistling  while  I  work." 
I  then  told  him  the  words  and  jokingly  asked  him  whether 
he  had  been  rejected  by  the  girl  he  loved.  He  emphatic- 
ally denied  it,  but  his  emotional  reactions  only  strength- 
ened my  suspicion  so  that  I  continued  my  investiga- 
tions. That  evening  we  met  at  a  cafe  and  after  I  had 
gained  his  confidence,  he  disburdened  his  heart.  Only 
the  evening  before  he  had  proposed  and  had  been 
rejected. 

These  examples  show  that  there  is  nothing  arbitrary  or 
fortuitous  in  our  actions.  No  matter  how  trivial  or 
voluntary,  analysis  always  shows  that  this  action  is  fully 
determined  by  unconscious  motives.  Those  who  believe 
in  a  free  will  naturally  dispute  this  theory,  but  it  ig 
always  possible  to  demonstrate  to  their  own  satisfaction 
that  whatever  they  consider  a  voluntary  act  done  with 
a  free  will  is  nevertheless  unconsciously  determined  by 
definite  motives.  One  of  my  unbelieving  patients 
forgot  his  umbrella  in  my  office  and  then  asked  me  to 
explain  this  forgetting.     "Surely,"  he  said,  "I  did  not 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  241 

wish  to  lose  a  new  umbrella."  I  fully  agreed  with  him 
for  if  he  wanted  to  lose  it  he  would  have  left  it  elsewhere. 
He  came  to  see  me  daily  and  as  the  rain  ceased  during 
his  visit  he  could  leave  it  until  his  next  visit.  Moreover, 
every  psychanalyst  knows  that  patients  who  are  pleased 
with  the  treatment  often  forget  things  at  the  doctor's 
office.  This  simply  means  that  they  expect  and  wish  to 
return.  We  never  forget  anything  valuable  where  we 
do  not  wish  to  return.  The  same  holds  true  for  losing 
things.  We  never  lose  what  we  value  highly  and,  other 
things  being  equal,  whatever  we  lose  we  usually  don't 
want.  A  distant  relative  of  Prof.  Freud,  who  on  account 
of  family  jealousy,  disputed  his  theories,  spoke  one  day 
very  disparagingly  about  his  theory  of  wit.  I  observed 
that  he  had  no  conception  of  the  subject  in  question  and 
did  not  hesitate  to  tell  him  this.  His  excuse  was  that  he 
could  not  read  the  whole  book  because  he  lost  it.  Here, 
of  course,  the  losing  was  intentional.  An  excellent 
example  of  definite  determinism  is  related  by  Dr.  Ernest 
Jones.  One  of  his  unbelieving  acquaintances  produced 
the  number  986  and  defied  him  to  connect  it  with  any- 
thing of  special  interest  in  the  mind.  Jones  made  use  of 
the  free-association  method  and  the  acquaintance  recalled 
the  following  associations:  Six  years  before  on  a  very 
hot  day  he  had  seen  a  joke  in  an  evening  newspaper 
which  stated  that  the  thermometer  had  stood  986°  Fahren- 
heit, evidently  an  exaggeration  of  98.6°  Fahrenheit. 
Jones  was  curious  to  know  why  this  memory  had  per- 
sisted with  such  vividness  as  to  be  so  readily  brought 
out,  for  with  most  persons  it  surely  would  have  been 
forgotten  beyond  recall  unless  it  became  associated  with 

16 


242  PSYCHANALYSIS 

some    other    mental    experience   of   more   significance. 

The  next  thought  was  the  general  reflection  that  the 
conception  of  heat  had  always  greatly  impressed  him, 
that  heat  was  the  most  important  thing  in  the  universe, 
the  source  of  life  and  so  on.  Jones  thought  that  the 
young  man's  prosaic  attitude  needed  some  explanation 
and  he  therefore  pressed  him  for  more  associations.  The 
next  thought  was  of  a  factory  stack  which  he  could  see 
from  his  bedroom  window.  He  often  stood  watching 
the  flame  and  smoke  issuing  out  of  it  in  the  evening  and 
reflecting  on  the  deplorable  waste  of  energy.  "Heat, 
flame,  the  source  of  life,  the  waste  of  vital  energy  issuing 
from  an  upright  hollow  tube — it  was  not  hard  to  divine 
from  such  associations  that  the  ideas  of  heat  and  fire 
were  unconsciously  linked  in  his  mind  with  the  idea  of 
love,  as  is  so  frequent  in  symbolic  thinking,  and  that 
there  was  a  strong  masturbation  complex  present,  a 
conclusion  that  he  presently  confirmed.  His  choice 
of  a  number  was  therefore  far  from  being  a  free  one, 
being  in  fact  related  to  a  very  significant  personal 
constellation." 

As  an  example  of  how  one  takes  up  innocent  associations 
for  the  purpose  of  giving  vent  to  one's  complexes  I  will 
relate  the  following  episode: 

A  husband  read  a  joke  in  some  periodical  which  struck 
him  as  being  particularly  funny  so  that  he  laughed 
heartily  at  it  and  then  repeated  it  to  his  wife.  The  joke 
was  something  like  this:  Teacher  (to  class  of  boys): 
"  Having  more  than  one  wife  is  polygamy.  Now,  Johnny, 
if  a  man  has  only  one  wife  what  would  you  call  that?" 
Johnny:  "Monotony."  To  the  surprise  of  the  husband 
his  wife  was  not  at  all  affected  by  the  joke.     Indeed  she 


PSYCHOPATHOLOGY    OF    EVERY-DAY    LIFE  243 

couldn't  see  why  he  laughed  so  much  over  it.  A  few 
days  later  while  visiting  a  friend  the  conversation  turned 
to  the  general  topic  of  man's  fickleness  and  so  on.  The 
wife  wistfully  remarked:  "I  know  exactly  in  what 
channels  Frank's  (husband)  mind  runs"  and  to  explain 
herself  she  repeated  the  aforementioned  joke,  but  when 
she  came  to  Johnny's  answer  she  said  "Monopoly" 
instead  of  "  monotony." 

The  mistake  here  corrects  the  tendency  of  the  joke. 
She  disliked  to  hear  her  husband  laugh  over  a  joke  the 
underlying  thought  of  which  was  to  the  effect  that  one 
wife  means  monotony.  She  realized  that  his  hearty 
laughter  signified  his  agreement  with  the  thought  under- 
lying the  joke.  It  pained  her  to  think  that  her  husband 
should  find  her  monotonous  and  laugh  at  a  joke  that 
suggested  polygamy.  Her  mistake  cleverly  expressed 
her  disapproval  of  the  idea  implied  by  the  joke  and  at  the 
same  time  shows  in  what  she  believed.  She  wanted  a 
monopoly  on  her  husband. 

Such  complex  indicators  expressed  in  every-day  con- 
versations and  actions  are  not  rare.  The  careful  observer 
finds  them  everywhere.  For  nothing  can  be  concealed. 
Repressed  thoughts  forever  strive  to  come  to  the  surface 
and  just  as  the  insane  realize  their  ideals  in  their  insani- 
ties, we  realize  their  wishes  through  our  dreams  and  in  the 
"little  ways"  of  every-day  life. 

References 

1.  Freud:  Psychopathology  of  Every-day  Life,  trans,  by  A.  A.  Brill. 
T.  Fisher  Unwin,  London. 

2.  Jones:  On  the  Nightmare,  Am.  Jour,  of  Insanity,  Jan.,  1910. 

3.  Ancient  Pagan  and  Modern  Christian  Symbolism,  p.  114. 

4.  Psychische  Grenzzustande.  Cohen,  Bonn,  1910. 

5.  Jones:  Papers  on  Psycho-analysis,  p.  36. 


CHAPTER  IX 

HYSTERICAL   FANCIES  AND  DREAMY  STATES 

"When  we  enter  into  the  deeper  mental  processes,  espe- 
cially into  those  of  hysteria,  we  invariably  come  across  the 
quaint  yet  familiar  psychic  mechanisms  of  fancies  or 
day  dreams.  Freud  tells  us  that  fancy  formation  is 
common  to  both  sexes  and  that  the  fancies  represent  wish 
gratifications  emanating  from  privation  and  longing. 
Like  dreams  they  serve  to  relieve  the  overburdened  mind 
and  to  secure  comfort  not  to  be  obtained  in  reality. 
They  are  called  "day  dreams"  because  they  furnish  the 
key  for  the  understanding  of  night  dreams.1  The  hyster- 
ical fancies  are  jealously  hidden  as  they  belong  to  the 
most  intimate  recesses  of  personality.  They  are  found 
in  both  normal  and  neurotic  individuals,  but  it  is  in  the 
latter  that  they  obtain  prominence  in  the  formation  of 
symptoms.  I  fully  agree  with  Freud  that  all  analyzable 
hysterical  attacks  prove  to  be  involuntary  incursions  of 
day  dreams.  Such  fancies  may  remain  conscious  or 
merge  into  the  unconscious.  In  the  latter  case  they  may 
become  pathogenic  and  express  themselves  in  symptoms 
and  attacks.  Under  favorable  conditions  it  is  possible 
for  consciousness  to  grasp  and  bring  to  light  such  uncon- 
scious fancies.  Freud  relates  that  one  of  his  patients 
whose  attention  was  called  to  these  fancies  later  narrated 
the  following  occurrence :  While  in  the  street  she  suddenly 
found  herself  in  tears  and  reflecting  over  the  cause  of  her 

244 


HYSTERICAL    FANCIES    AND    DREAMY    STATES  245 

weeping  the  fancy  became  clear  to  her.  She  fancied  her- 
self in  delicate  relationship  with  a  musician  famous  in  the 
city  whom  she  did  not  know.  In  her  fancy  she  bore  him 
a  child  (she  was  childless) ;  later  he  deserted  her,  leaving  her 
in  misery  with  the  child.  At  this  stage  of  the  romance  she 
burst  into  tears. 

Such  unconscious  fancies  have  either  been  unconscious 
from  the  first,  having  been  formed  in  the  unconscious,  or, 
what  is  more  usual,  they  were  once  conscious  and  then 
intentionally  forgotten  and  repressed  into  the  uncon- 
scious. Their  content  usually  undergoes  many  trans- 
formations and  the  resultant  symptom  or  attack  is  often 
a  very  distorted  mechanism.  Analysis  shows  that  the 
unconscious  fancies  are  intimately  connected  with  the 
person's  sexual  life.  They  are  identical  with  the  fancy 
which  led  to  sexual  gratification  during  the  period  of 
masturbation.  The  masturbating  act  originally  consists 
of  two  parts,  the  provocation  of  the  fancy  and  the  active 
performance  of  self  gratification  at  its  height.  It  is  first 
autoerotic  and  undertaken  for  the  pleasure  obtained 
from  an  erogenous  zone,  but  later  it  becomes  blended 
with  a  wish  presentation  referring  to  the  love  object  and 
serves  for  a  partial  realization  of  the  situation  in  which 
this  fancy  culminates.  If  this  masturbo-fantastic  grati- 
fication remains  undone,  the  fancy  changes  from  a  con- 
scious to  an  unconscious  one.  If  no  other  manner  of 
sexual  gratification  occurs,  that  is,  if  the  person  remains 
an  abstainer  and  does  not  succeed  in  fully  sublimating 
his  libido,  the  unconscious  fancies  become  refreshed. 
They  grow  exuberantly  and  at  least  a  fragment  of  their 
content  forms  into  symptoms  or  attacks. 


246  PSYCHANALYSIS 

The  hysterical  symptoms  arc  merely  unconscious 
fancies  brought  to  light  by  "conversion"  and  inasmuch 
as  they  arc  somatic  expressions  they  are  often  taken  from 
the  spheres  of  the  sexual  feelings  and  motor  innervation 
which  originally  accompanied  the  former  still  conscious 
fancy.  The  disuse  of  onanism  is  thus  made  .retrogressive 
and  the  final  aim  of  the  whole  morbid  process,  the  restora- 
tion of  the  primary  sexual  gratification,  though  never 
attaining  perfection,  always  comes  near  to  it.  When  we 
analyze  these  unconscious  fancies  of  hysterics  we  find 
that  they  correspond  in  content  to  the  situations  of  grati- 
fication enacted  by  perverts  consciously.  Thus,  an  hyster- 
ical woman  of  thirty  years  went  through  strange  episodes 
lasting  from  a  few  hours  to  days  and  weeks.  One  of  these 
attacks  which  recurred  quite  often  manifested  itself  by 
extreme  anxiety  during  which  the  patient  was  very 
restless  and  anxious.  She  acted  as  though  she  was 
terrified.  She  moaned  and  cried,  uttering  the  words 
"virtue,  doctor,  heroine/'  and  made  continuous  attempts 
to  get  out  of  the  room.  The  attack  was  always  followed 
by  an  hysterical  paralysis  and  excruciating  pain  in  her 
legs  which  lasted  for  a  few  days.  At  times  the  attacks 
were  characterized  by  some  variations,  ending  with  the 
arc  de  cercle,  but  they  were  essentially  as  described. 
Analysis  showed  that  she  identified  herself  with  Maupas- 
sant's Clochette  who  broke  her  leg  by  jumping  out  of  a 
second  story  window  when  surprised  with  her  cowardly 
lover  during  a  tryst  in  a  loft.2 

These  attacks  came  on  first  after  some  gossip  about  her 
former  love  affair  was  repeated  to  her  and  meant  to  show 
that  the  statements  were  false,  or  in  other  words,  that 


HYSTERICAL    FANCIES    AND    DREAMY    STATES  247 

like  Clochette  "she  was  a  martyr  and  a  noble  soul." 
The  words  she  muttered  were  those  repeated  by  the 
doctor  in  the  story  who  said  of  Clochette:  "That  was  her 
only  love  affair  and  she  died  a  virgin."  The  identification 
was  determined  by  the  following  facts:  She  had  a  love 
affair  lasting  for  about  a  year  which  terminated  with  the 
sudden  disappearance  of  her  fiance.  Some  evil  tongues 
had  it  that  she  was  left  in  a  delicate  state  and  her  mother 
thought  seriously  of  asking  the  family  physician  to  silence 
the  gossip.  When  she  became  hysterical  one  of  her 
symptoms  was  pain  all  over  the  body  especially  in  her 
legs.  It  was  during  a  rest  cure  that  she  read  Maupas- 
sant's Clochette  which  readily  took  her  fancy  not  because 
it  showed  a  striking  resemblance  to  her  case,  but  because 
she  wished  to  be  like  Clochette  and  be  defended  by  her 
doctor.  In  the  course  of  time  this  wish  allied  itself  with 
other  wishes  and  the  whole  thing  was  subjected  to  the 
influence  of  the  psychic  censor.  That  accounted  for  the 
different  variations  which  as  in  dreams  were  produced 
by  condensation,  multiple  identification  and  inversion  of 
events,  etc.3  Thus  the  arc  de  cercle  was  simply  an  inver- 
sion of  the  position  during  coitus. 

Another  patient,  Miss  M.,  thirty-six  years  old,  an  hys- 
teric with  many  degenerative  trends,  referred  to  me  by 
Dr.  Frederick  Peterson,  went  through  many  minor  and 
major  attacks  which  were  based  on  real  and  fancied 
experiences.  Her  main  symptom  was  an  astasia  abasia 
which  lasted  for  years.  She  could  neither  walk  nor 
sit  up  for  any  length  of  time  and  was  forced  to  remain  in 
bed  in  a  peculiar  constrained  attitude,  her  body  forming 
an  angle,  her  head  and  legs  being  raised  high  by  many 


248  PSY<  HANALYSIS 

pillows.  Analysis  brought  out  the  following  facts:  As  a 
child  she  masturbated  herself  and  other  children  and 
resorted  to  many  coprophilic  activities  such  as  playing 
with  urine  and  feces.  This  was  followed  by  a  marked 
repression  which  gave  rise  to  extreme  feelings  of  disgust 
and  morality.  This  stage  was  followed  by  a  failure  in 
the  repression  and  a  return  of  the  things  repressed.  She 
then  evinced  a  polymorphous  perverse  sexuality  and 
practised  many  coprophilic  activities.  She  refused  to 
empty  her  bowels  for  days  and  sometimes  for  over  a  week 
in  spite  of  all  medications.  While  taking  a  rest  cure  in 
a  well-known  sanatorium  she  made  believe  that  she 
could  not  attend  to  her  natural  wants,  causing  thereby 
much  worriment  and  alarm  to  the  doctors  and  nurses. 
While  they  exerted  all  their  efforts  to  alleviate  her  appar- 
ent distress  she  was  stealing  towels  and  used  them  as 
receptacles  for  her  excretions.  She  secretly  threw  these 
out  of  the  window  or  hid  them  in  her  room.  Her  fancies 
were  very  prolific  and  the  material  for  them  was  furnished 
by  both  fiction  and  reality.  She  was  an  ardent  reader 
and  whatever  appealed  to  her  fancy  was  immediately 
taken  up  and  elaborated  into  her  complexes.  Her  im- 
aginative but  rather  defective  mind  made  no  distinction 
between  fact  and  fancy  so  that  whatever  was  once  a 
fancy  based  on  something  read  or  heard  soon  became  to 
her  an  actual  experience. 

She  often  recalled  the  typical  pseudologia  phantastica. 
It  was  due  to  this  that  she  accused  every  physician  coming 
in  professional  contact  with  her  of  having  sexual  designs 
upon  her.  It  was  really  comical  to  hear  the  accusations 
she  brought  against  at  least  a  dozen  of  our  most  reputable 


HYSTERICAL    FANCIES    AND    DREAMY    STATES  249 

men  in  the  medical  profession.  She  stated  that  everyone 
of  them  wanted  to  make  her  his  mistress.  She  had  abso- 
lutely no  reason  to  give  for  her  belief  and  psychanalysis 
showed  that  they  were  merely  suppressed  wish-phan- 
tasies which  came  to  the  surface  as  outer  perceptions. 
This  is  the  usual  mechanism  of  all  hysterical  accusations 
against  doctors. 

The  more  deeply  I  penetrated  into  the  patient's  uncon- 
scious the  more  I  became  convinced  that  almost  every 
one  of  her  symptoms  and  attacks  was  determined  by  some 
former  fancy.  She  read  some  erotic  story  and  identified 
herself  with  one  of  the  characters,  and  then  lived  through 
the  whole  situation  over  and  over  again.  As  she  was 
bisexual  she  often  identified  herself  with  the  male  char- 
acter of  the  story  and  then  lived  through,  as  it  were,  his 
part.  A  recurrent  episode  of  this  nature  was  the  follow- 
ing: She  began  with  a  period  of  exaltation  during  which 
she  would  be  very  talkative  and  vivacious.  She  would 
play  the  piano  and  act  some  part  (she  was  once  an  actress) , 
usually  the  part  of  a  man.  This  would  continue  from 
an  hour  to  a  few  days  and  would  suddenly  be  interrupted 
by  severe  headaches,  nausea  with  occasional  vomiting 
and  a  marked  aggravation  of  the  pains  in  her  groin, 
abdomen  and  legs  which  she  called  "the  three-cornered 
stone  pains."  The  analysis  brought  out  the  following 
facts:  At  a  very  early  age  her  father,  wishing  to  stop  her 
from  crying,  once  put  his  hand  under  her  dress  and 
pinched  her  bare  buttock  and  legs.  This  was  often 
repeated  on  similar  occasions  and  always  had  its  effect. 
She  then  became  very  sensitive  in  these  regions.  She 
could  not  tolerate  the  slightest  pressure  there  and  was 


250  PSYCHANALYSIS 

always  complaining  of  her  shoes  and  stockings.  On 
one  of  these  occasions  when  her  father  impatiently  asked 
her  what  ailed  her  she  lied  and  said  that  the  skin  was 
rubbed  off  her  foot.  He  forced  her  to  remove  her  shoe 
in  the  presence  of  many  strangers  and  as  no  abrasion  was 
found  she  was  very  much  humiliated.  About  the  same 
time  her  mother  once  forced  her  to  sleep  with  a  young 
man  because  there  were  many  guests  in  the  house.  She 
again  received  a  psychic  trauma  in  the  same  region. 
Added  to  this  she  has  a  rather  high  instep  which  serves  to 
accentuate  her  sensitiveness  in  her  legs  and  feet.  All 
these  traumas  took  place  before  the  age  of  five  years. 
At  the  age  of  puberty  she  attended  a  private  school  and 
one  night  she  witnessed  by  chance  a  homosexual  act 
between  a  teacher  and  a  favorite  pupil.  Years  later  she 
was  abnormally  fond  of  X.,  a  girl  of  her  own  age.  It  was 
about  this  time  that  she  read  Balzac's  Droll  Stories  and 
was  very  much  affected  by  one  of  them.  It  dealt  with 
a  gay  cavalier  who  seduced  an  innocent  girl.  This  story 
produced  many  erotic  feelings  and  fancies  which  con- 
tinued for  months  until  one  day  she  dressed  in  male 
attire  and  called  on  X.  She  made  believe  that  she  was 
doing  this  just  for  fun  and  was  demonstrating  to  X.  how 
well  she  could  play  the  part  of  a  gay  cavalier.  The  demon- 
stration ended  with  a  gross  homosexual  episode  between 
herself  and  X.,  and  as  the  latter  was  at  the  time  engaged 
to  be  married  she  became  very  remorseful  and  blamed 
M.  for  leading  her  into  temptation,  adding  "How  can 
I  look  John  (fiance')  in  the  face?"  This,  in  turn,  caused 
reproach  and  self-accusation  in  M.,  who  brooded  over 
it  for  some  time  and  gradually  repressed  it.     The  attack 


HYSTERICAL   FANCIES    AND    DREAMY    STATES  251 

mentioned  above  appeared  shortly  thereafter.  It  repre- 
sented a  fragment  of  sexual  activity  which  becomes  quite 
transparent  when  we  think  of  the  episode  with  X. 

Some  fancies  are  pure  fabrications  constructed  of  the 
patient's  wishes.  Thus,  an  intelligent  young  woman  of 
thirty  years  sent  to  me  for  treatment  by  Dr.  Israel  Strauss 
had  one  fancy  which  she  lived  through  from  time  to  time. 
She  imagined  herself  married  to  a  tall,  handsome  and 
very  wealthy  man.  She  had  three  children,  the  like  of 
whom  did  not  exist.  She  lived  on  a  beautiful  yacht  and 
entertained  only  such  people  as  she  and  her  husband 
really  liked.  This  state  of  blissful  happiness  existed 
for  a  few  days  during  which  she  was  happy  and  contented. 
Then  the  whole  structure  crumbled.  Her  husband  and 
children  died  and  she  was  left  alone  in  terrible  depression 
lasting  for  days.  She  assured  me  that  her  reactions 
were  very  vivid  and  real,  being  mindful,  however,  that  the 
whole  episode  was  only  a  fancy. 

Besides  these  fancies  we  come  across  other  strange 
psychic  processes  which  are  designated  as  hysterical 
dreamy  states.  They  are  not  the  protracted  crepuscular 
episodes  followed  by  partial  or  complete  amnesia  which 
were  described  by  Ganser  and  others  and  often  taken  as 
psychic  equivalents  of  motor  epilepsy,  but  they  represent 
these  peculiar  conditions  so  often  observed  in  psycho- 
neurotics which  were  first  described  by  Lowenfeld4  and 
later  submitted  to  a  thorough  psychanalytic  study  by 
Abraham.5  The  characteristics  of  these  states  will  be 
best  described  by  recalling  to  you  the  familiar  old  fable 
which  is  said  to  have  originated  in  India  and  passed  from 
the  Sanskrit  versions  with  many  variations  into  many 


252  PSYCIIANALYSIS 

languages.  The  story  select  ed  by  me  tells  how  an  oriental 
glass  vender  sat  cross  legged  with  his  basket  of  glassware 
in  front  of  him.  While  wishing  for  purchasers  he  merged 
into  the  following  reverie:  "If  I  sell  this  whole  basket 
of  glass  I  shall  have  ten  dinars.  I  will  then  buy  glass- 
ware for  the  whole  sum  and  when  that  is  sold  I  shall  have 
twenty  dinars.  I  will  then  buy  glass  for  twenty  dinars 
and  sell  it  for  forty  dinars.  For  this  sum  I  shall  again 
buy  glassware  and  when  that  will  be  sold  I  shall  be  worth 
eighty  dinars/'  etc.  In  his  reverie  he  kept  doubling  his 
fortune  until  he  was  immensely  rich.  He  bought  en- 
chanted palaces,  lived  in  luxury  and  lavished  fortunes. 
His  fancies  became  more  and  more  extravagant.  He  was 
very  happy  and  elated  when  a  slight  movement  suddenly 
reminded  him  of  his  basket  and  the  thought  flashed 
through  his  mind  "What's  the  use  of  bothering  with 
such  worthless  stuff?"  And  with  that  he  kicked  the 
basket  over.  The  clanging  of  the  broken  glass  interrupted 
his  day  dream  and  brought  him  back  to  himself. 

Let  us  for  a  moment  think  of  this  story  which,  si  non  e 
vero,  h  ben  trovato,  and  examine  the  different  mental 
operations  which  enter  into  its  formation.  It  shows  the 
following  fairly  well  defined  stages:  There  is  a  first  stage 
of  fantastic  exaltation,  the  content  of  which  deals  with 
the  individual's  hopes  and  aspirations.  The  glass  vender 
is  in  a  state  of  euphoria.  From  a  poor  man  he  is  sud- 
denly transformed  into  a  man  of  wealth  and  his  fortune 
is  rapidly  increasing.  This  is  followed  by  a  stage  of 
dream-like  withdrawal  from  reality.  He  is  no  longer 
controlled  by  logical,  judgment  and  reasoning.  His 
fancies,   therefore,  run  riot  as  it  were.     Everything  is 


HYSTERICAL   FANCIES   AND    DREAMY    STATES  253 

changed.  It  is  like  a  dream  where  time,  space  and  natural 
obstacles  are  absent.  He  amasses  an  enormous  fortune 
and  owns  palaces,  etc.  In  brief,  he  is  no  longer  himself. 
This  is  followed  by  a  very  rapid  third  stage  which  is  dis- 
tinguished by  a  suspension  of  consciousness,  an  absent- 
mindedness  during  which  there  are  no  thoughts  so  to 
speak,  and  the  whole  episode  is  followed  by  depression 
characterized  by  anxiety  with  its  concomitant  manifes- 
tations.6 I  need  hardly  say  that  our  hero  must  have 
been  depressed  on  emerging  from  his  revery. 

In  almost  all  the  cases  observed  by  me  these  three 
stages,  which  were  originally  described  by  Abraham,7 
could  readily  be  distinguished,  but  I  should  like  to  add 
that  the  first  stage  is  always  preceded  by  a  period  of 
craving. 

Without  going  into  detailed  histories  I  shall  cite  some 
of  my  own  observations. 

Case  I. — I.  C.  was  seen  by  me  in  the  neurological  department  of 
the  Vanderbilt  Clinic  in  November,  1908.  Among  other  things  he 
complained  of  strange  thoughts  which  interfered  with  his  work.  He 
stated  that  he  was  a  weaver  by  trade  and  that  for  months  he  was 
hardly  able  to  attend  to  his  work.  He  explained  that  weaving  re- 
quired concentration  of  attention,  as  a  great  deal  of  counting  had 
to  be  done  and  that  a  single  mistake  spoiled  the  work.  His 
"  foolish  "  thoughts  would  come  in  spite  of  all  effort  to  keep  them  away. 
They  absorbed  his  mind  to  an  extent  that  he  forgot  his  work  and 
unconsciously  stopped  weaving  and  continued  dreaming  until  aroused. 
As  examples  he  gave  a  few  experiences  of  the  previous  day,  which, 
in  his  own  words,  read  as  follows:  "I  am  working  and  unconsciously 
I  begin  to  think  what  I  should  do  if  I  had  two  thousand  dollars.  I 
start  a  shop  and  soon  earn  a  lot  of  money  because  I  oppress  my 
employees.  With  the  money  thus  gained  I  open  a  big  factory  and 
employ  a  lot  of  greenhorns  whom  I  force  to  work  long  hours  for  very 
little   pay.     I   enlarge    my   business.     I   have   hundreds   of   people 


254  PSYCHANALYSIS 

working  for  mo.     I  become  greater  and  greater when  I 

suddenly  find  myself  crying  because  I  have  lost  all  my  money  in 
Wall  Street," 

"  I  marry  a  very  nice  girl.  She  is  very  much  in  love  with  me,  but 
.she  is  afraid  of  me.  I  am  very  tyrannical  and  brutal.  She  has  to  do 
what  1  tell  her,  otherwise  I  beat  her.  She  cries  and  begs  me  not  to 
kill  her,  but  I  pay  no  attention  to  her.  I  become  more  and  more 
excited.  I  hardly  know  what  I  do  when  I  suddenly  wake  up  wringing 
my  hands  because  she  is  dead." 

He  recited  many  more  day  dreams,  but  they  were  all  of  the  same 
nature.     They  all  dealt  with  wealth  and  murder. 

Recalling  Freud's  saying  that  the  contented  individual 
does    not    indulge  in  fantasies   I  assumed    that    these 
dreamy   states   must   represent   some   of   the    patient's 
wishes,   and  viewed  superficially  one  may   think    that 
the   first    dreamy    state    corroborates   this    assumption. 
The  patient  is  a  poor  weaver  who  believes  himself  op- 
pressed by  his  employer  and  therefore  dreams  of  changing 
places  with  his  oppressor.     His  day  dream  is  simply  a 
realization  of  his  wishes.     But  a  number  of  questions 
arise  as  soon  as  we  take  a  closer  view  of  the  subject.     In 
the  first  place  it  cannot  be  said  that  it  is  really  a  wish 
realization  as  the  money  thus  rapidly  gained  is  as  rapidly 
lost,  leaving  the  patient  unhappier  than  he  was.     It  may 
also  be  asked  why  the  patient  is  not  satisfied  with  the 
everyday  conscious  day  dreaming.     Why  do  these  dreamy 
states  come  in  attacks?    Why  are  they  accompanied  by 
complete  oblivion  to  external  impressions,  especially  at 
their  height,  and  why  does  the  patient  perceive  them  as 
unreal    and    strange?     Moreover,   when    we    recall    the 
second  dream,  we  can  no  longer  think  of  any  wish  realiza- 
tion, for  the  patient  is  single  and  is  very  much  in  love 
with  his  fiancee  whom  he  wishes  to  marry. 


HYSTERICAL    FANCIES    AND    DREAMY    STATES  255 

From  the  study  of  dreams  we  have  learned  that  no 
matter  how  absurd  a  dream  may  seem  it  nevertheless 
contains  sense  and  meaning  if  we  find  its  latent  content, 
and  that  every  dream,  and  for  that  matter  every  psy- 
chotic symptom,  contains  the  hidden  fulfilment  of  a 
repressed  wish8  which  usually  refers  to  the  two  great 
impulses,  hunger  and  love.  Freud  has  also  shown  that 
certain  episodic  manifestations  of  hysteria  are  simply 
substitutive  gratifications  for  the  abandoned  mastur- 
bation,9 and  Abraham  maintains  that  the  same  is  true 
for  the  hysterical  dreamy  state.  Let  us  see  whether 
this  is  true  in  our  patient. 

I  regret  that  I  was  unable  to  make  a  complete  analysis 
of  his  case.  The  patient  was  a  clinic  one  and,  as  often 
happens  in  such  cases,  the  analysis  had  to  be  given  up. 
Still  the  facts  that  I  have  obtained  are  sufficient  to  con- 
firm the  assumption  that  his  dreamy  states  were  sub- 
stitutions for  his  masturbation.  His  history  was,  briefly, 
as  follows: 

I.  C.  was  twenty-two  years  old  and  had  masturbated  on  and  off 
since  the  age  of  twelve.  From  a  very  early  age  he  had  been  suffering 
from  a  mixed  neurosis  (anxiety  hysteria  and  compulsion  neurosis) 
which  was  due  to  many  conflicts  and  repressions.  At  the  age  of 
seventeen  years  he  consorted  with  women  and  masturbated  exces- 
sively besides.  He  came  to  New  York  at  twenty  years  of  age  and  after 
that  tried  very  hard  to  abstain  from  sexual  indulgence,  but  often 
failed.  At  twenty-two  years  he  fell  in  love  and  decided  to  lead  a  life 
of  sexual  abstinence  until  his  marriage  which  was  to  take  place  in 
March,  1909.  The  sadistic  day  dreams  described  above  came  on 
after  a  few  weeks  of  hard  struggle.  He  was  always  given  to  day 
dreaming,  but  he  himself  sharply  distinguished  between  his  former 
air  castles  and  his  present  day  dreams,  by  saying  that  the  latter  were 
beyond  his  control  because  they  were  always  accompanied  by  a 


256  PSYCHANALYSIS 

"short  fainting  spell."  We  arc  therefore  justified  in  saying  that 
there  was  a  direct  relationship  between  the  suppressed  sexual  activi- 
ties and  his  fantastic  day  dreams. 

If  we  bear  in  mind  the  different  stages  described  above 
and  follow  the  act  of  masturbation  we  can  at  once  see  a 
distinct  analogy.  Here  as  there  there  is  a  preliminary 
craving  followed  by  a  pleasurable  stage,  and  the  second 
and  third  stages  of  the  day  dream,  the  withdrawal  from 
reality  and  absent  mindedness  fully  correspond  to  the 
increasing  sexual  excitement  and  its  acme  at  the  moment 
of  ejaculation.  It  is  well  known  that  coitus  was  com- 
pared by  many  writers  to  a  minor  epileptic  attack.  Also 
the  terminal  depression  corresponds  to  the  same  stage  of 
coitus  or  its  inadequate  outlet,  masturbation.  Post 
coitum  animal  triste  is  an  old  saying  equally  true  of  mas- 
turbation which  is  always  followed  by  self-reproach. 

To  illustrate  the  psychological  significance  of  dreamy 
states  the  following  case  will  serve: 

Case  II. — A.,  referred  to  me  for  treatment  by  Dr.  Frederick 
Peterson,  was  a  rising  journalist  of  twenty-six  years.  He  was 
addicted  to  dreamy  states  most  of  which  showed  the  three  stages  cited 
above.  A  few  examples  recited  by  himself  will  give  us  an  idea  of 
their  nature:  "  I  am  running  a  race  and  I  feel  fine  because  I  am  sure 
of  winning.  I  am  accidentally  struck  in  the  thigh  with  the  spiked 
shoe  of  one  of  my  competitors.  I  am  bleeding,  but  I  don't  seem  to 
feel  it.  I  am  very  excited  because  I  am  getting  ahead  of  the  others. 
Some  trainers  try  to  stop  me  because  they  imagine  I  am  hurt,  but 
I  punch  them  and  run  on.  I  win  the  race,  but  collapse  from  exhaus- 
tion.    I  am  carried  out  amidst  the  applause  of  the  crowd." 

"  I  am  taking  a  walk  with  a  party  of  young  men  and  women.  We 
are  held  up  by  a  highwayman.  We  all  submit  to  it.  I  stand  with 
my  hands  up,  but  taking  advantage  of  the  highwayman's  momentary 
inattention  I  throw  myself  upon  him,  take  away  his  pistol  and  strike 
him  on  the  head  with  it.     I  beat  him  into  submission  and  then  lead 


HYSTERICAL   FANCIES    AND    DREAMY    STATES  257 

him  by  the  collar  to  the  police  station  amidst  the  great  applause  of 
my  companions,  who,  being  Jews,  are  astonished  at  my  bravery. 

"  I  escape  from  home  and  make  my  way  to  China.  I  insinuate 
myself  into  court  and  become  a  favorite  of  the  Dowager  Empress.  I 
am  put  in  charge  of  the  army  which  I  train  to  great  efficiency.  A 
rebellion  breaks  out.  I  lead  the  army.  The  emperor,  who  is  on  the 
other  side  is  killed  or  dies  (vague).  As  a  reward  for  my  services  I 
marry  the  Dowager  Empress  who  looks  like  my  mother.  This 
happiness  does  not  last  very  long,  for  I  am  deposed  and  returned  to 
New  York  an  exile." 

The  patient  stated  that  these  day  dreams  usually  came  when  he 
was  writing  and  that  they  were  entirely  beyond  his  control.  He 
himself  referred  to  them  "as  a  sort  of  absent-mindedness  during 
which  I  am  like  a  somnambulist." 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  in  both  patients  the  dreams 
appeared  during  mental  concentration.  This  fully  cor- 
roborates what  Freud  states  in  his  Three  Contributions 
to  the  Sexual  Theory,  viz.,  that  mental  application  to  an 
intellectual  accomplishment  will  often  result,  especially 
in  youthful  persons,  in  a  simultaneous  sexual  excitement. 
Another  striking  point  in  all  these  dreamy  states  is  the 
emotional  lability  in  the  different  stages.  The  dreamer 
distinctly  realizes  that  the  first  two  stages  are  of  a  pleasur- 
able nature,  while  the  last  stage  is  of  a  depressive  painful 
nature. 

I  shall  not  go  into  long  analytical  explanations.  I  will 
content  myself  by  stating  that  here,  too,  the  day  dreams 
were  substitutes  for  the  abandoned  masturbation  and 
will  proceed  with  the  analysis  of  day  dreams  proper. 

We  have  said  above  that  the  psychosexual  constitution 
of  the  individual  is  made  up  of  many  components  and 
partial  impulses  which  run  through  a  definite  evolution. 
These  impulses  are  active  in  infancy,  but  normally  they 

17 


258  PSYCHANALYSIS 

arc  gradually  repressed,  leaving  only  slight  traces  of  their 
former  existence.  As  we  discussed  this  question  above 
I  shall  briefly  refer  to  the  impulses  of  exhibitionism  and 
cruelty  only. 

It  is  well  known  that  unlike  adults,  children  like  to 
show  themselves  naked,  that  is  they  like  to  exhibit.  It 
is  not  at  all  unusual  to  see  children  of  both  sexes  exposing 
themselves  coram  publico.  Shame  is  a  matter  of  train- 
ing. I  know  a  little  girl  of  six  years,  who  at  the  age  of 
three  or  four  used  to  invite  her  grown-up  acquaintances 
to  be  present  while  she  took  her  bath  and  who  now 
blushes  at  any  allusion  to  it.  That  the  Golden  Rule  is 
not  inherent  in  the  human  being  is  also  well  known. 
Cruelty  in  our  sense  is  common  to  childhood.  I  believe 
it  is  La  Fontaine  who  calls  childhood  "an  age  without 
pity."  That  cruelty  and  exhibitionism  are  intimately 
connected  with  sex  is  hardly  necessary  to  mention. 
Naturalists  and  anthropologists  have  repeatedly  called 
attention  to  it.  Freud,  who  has  perhaps  penetrated 
deeper  then  any  one  else,  shows10  that  when  these  inpulses 
are  repressed  by  a  process  of  training  and  education  they 
form  certain  reactions  like  modesty  and  sympathy  which 
go  to  make  up  the  character  of  the  individual.  But  as 
no  impulse  is  entirely  suspended,  one  can  always  find 
some  traces  of  it  in  the  individual's  character.  Thus 
persons  inclined  to  obscene  joking  usually  conceal  a  desire 
to  exhibit  and  persons  having  a  strong  sadistic  or  cruel 
component  in  their  sexuality,  which  is  more  or  less 
inhibited,  are  most  successful  with  the  tendency  wit  of 
aggression.11  If  for  some  reason  these  impulses  cannot 
be  repressed  or  when  later  in  life  there  is  a  failure  of 


HYSTERICAL   FANCIES    AND    DREAMY    STATES  259 

repression,  the  individual  remains  a  sexual  exhibitionist 
or  sadist,  or  he  suffers  from  a  neurosis  in  which  these 
impulses  come  to  the  surface  in  some  negative  form. 
One  of  the  distressing  symptoms  for  which  A.  sought 
relief  was  an  irresistible  impulse  to  pinch  women.  His 
fancies  simply  reflected  his  symptoms.  The  first  two 
day  dreams  nicely  illustrate,  in  a  rather  hidden  form, 
his  exhibitionism  as  well  as  his  sadism.  The  third  one, 
referring  to  his  marrying  the  dowager  empress  who 
looked  like  his  mother,  shows  a  very  nice  unconscious 
mechanism,  the  so-called  Oedipus  complex.12  His  neu- 
rosis is  the  result  of  a  conflict  between  his  conscious  resist- 
ances and  his  unconscious  attachment  to  his  mother. 
As  with  every  little  boy,  his  mother  was  the  first  woman 
he  loved,  but  unlike  the  others  his  libido  remained  fixed 
on  her.  This  is  a  very  common  mechanism  and,  as 
shown  by  Abraham,  accounts  for  so  many  consanguineous 
marriages.  Neurotics,  who  are  unconsciously  attached 
to  their  parents,  either  never  marry  because  "no  girl  is 
like  mother"  or  marry  some  member  of  the  family  who 
resembles  the  parent.  As  a  little  boy  our  patient  often 
found  home  too  small  for  him  and  his  father.  He  was  his 
rival,  as  it  were,  for  his  mother's  affection  and  for  that 
reason  he  often  wished  him  dead.  Now  as  a  grown-up 
man  he  still  finds  life  burdensome  because  he  cannot 
tolerate  his  superiors  who  take  the  place  of  his  father  and 
he  consequently  entertains  murderous  thoughts  toward 
them.  The  morning  before  this  day  dream  he  read  about 
the  war  in  China  and  that  the  army  had  been  trained  by 
foreign  officers.  This  was  the  main  determinant  of  the 
last  dream,  but  the  other  elements  that  enter  into  its 


2G0  PSYCHANALYSIS 

formation  are  part  and  parcel  of  his  neurosis.  In  his  day 
dreams  he  runs  away  from  home  and  becomes  a  great 
man,  because  in  reality  he  dislikes  the  idea  of  having  to 
stay  at  home  and  be  supported  by  his  parents  who  lately 
referred  to  it  rather  unkindly.  In  this  rebellion  he  either 
kills  the  emperor  or  he  dies.  Such  vague  statements 
occurring  in  day  or  night  dreams  indicate  a  marked 
repression.  Here  the  emperor  stands  for  his  father.13 
He  thus  kills  his  father  and  is  united  to  his  childhood 
ideal.  But,  as  he  is  no  longer  a  child,  the  dream  shows 
the  influence  of  the  incest  barriers  which  were  formed 
during  his  development.  He  is  therefore  deposed  and 
returned  to  New  York  an  exile.  This  sudden  fiasco  is 
also  constellated  by  the  depressive  emotional  tone  of  the 
terminal  stage  of  masturbation  which  invests,  so  to  say, 
the  last  stage  of  the  day  dream  and  determines  its  char- 
acter. That  A.'s  first  two  day  dreams  lack  the  depress- 
ive thoughts  which  go  to  make  up  the  terminal  stage 
of  masturbation  is  not  without  reason. 

I  have  purposely  selected  these  examples  because  they 
demonstrate  a  rather  interesting  mechanism.  They 
always  appeared  after  the  patient  practised  interrupted 
masturbation.  As  you  know  this  is  a  common  practice 
of  masturbators,  who  imagine  that  loss  of  seminal  fluid 
is  loss  of  vitality. 

In  conclusion  it  may  be  said  that  this  type  of  day 
dreaming  is  simply  a  substitution  for  the  abandoned 
masturbation.  The  unrequited  libido  seeking  an  outlet 
invests  those  thoughts  which  are  in  some  way  connected 
with  the  individual's  hopes  and  strivings.  Like  the  wolf 
in  the  lamb's  skin  they  look  quite  innocent  at  first  sight, 


HYSTERICAL   FANCIES    AND    DREAMY    STATES  261 

but  on  closer  investigation  it  becomes  very  evident  that 
they  represent  repressed  wishes  of  the  person's  psycho- 
sexual  life  and  thus  constitute  a  concealed  form  of  mental 
masturbation. 

References 

1.  Freud:  Selected  Papers  on  Hysteria,  p.  195. 

2.  For  the  Mechanism  of  Identification,  see  Chap.  VII. 

3.  Freud:  Allgemeines   iiber    den   hysterischen  Anfall,  Sammlung 
kleiner  Schriften  zur  Neurosenlehre,  Second  series,  Deuticke,  Wien. 

4.  Zentralblatt  fur  Nervenheilkunde,  August,  1909. 

5.  Ueber  hysterische  Traumzustande,  Jahrbuch  fiir  Psychoanalyse 
Vol.  II. 

6.  Cf.  Chap.  III. 

7.  L.  c. 

8.  Cf.  Chap.  II. 

9.  L.  c. 

10.  Three  contributions  to  the  Sexual  Theory,  translated  by  A.  A. 
Brill. 

11.  Cf.  Chap.  XIV. 

12.  Cf.  Chap.  X. 

13.  This  is  a  rather  common  identification,  see  Freud:    The  Inter- 
pretation of  Dreams;  also  Chap.  X. 


CHAPTER   X 

THE  OEDIPUS  COMPLEX 

The  latent  influence  on  normal  persons;  its  negative 
manifestations  in  the  psychoneuroses  and  psychoses 

Of  the  many  interesting  and  valuable  discoveries 
furnished  to  us  through  psychanalysis  none  is  as  impor- 
tant as  those  facts  which  treat  of  the  individual's  relation 
to  the  family  and  society.  In  our  psychanalytic  work 
with  patients  we  find  that  parents  play  the  leading  part 
in  their  infantile  psychic  life.  This  fact  is  so  universal 
and  important  that  we  may  say  that  unless  it  is  thoroughly 
elaborated  and  discussed  with  the  patient  no  analysis 
is  complete  or  effective.  Studies  made  on  psychoneu- 
rotics amply  demonstrate  that  contrary  to  the  accepted 
opinions  neurotics  are  only  exaggerations  of  the  normal 
and  that  the  modes  of  reaction  in  both  are  about  the 
same.  The  only  difference  lies  in  the  fact  that  one  can 
adjust  himself  to  his  environments  while  the  other  finds 
it  difficult  or  impossible  to  do  so.  If  one  should  ask 
wherein  these  difficulties  lie  the  experienced  psychan- 
alyst  would  readily  point  to  the  parents.  Indeed  the 
more  we  study  the  psychoneuroses  and  the  psychoses  the 
clearer  it  becomes  that  the  most  potent  factor  in  their 
determination  is  the  early  parental  influence.  That  our 
parents  should  play  a  leading  part  in  our  lives  is  so  ob- 
vious that  it  hardly  needs  further  discussion.     The  strange 

part  of  it,  however,  is  the  fact  that  these  relations  are  not 

2G2 


THE    OEDIPUS    COMPLEX 


263 


as  amicable  or  peaceful  as  seems  at  first  sight.  What  I 
mean  to  say  is  that,  contrary  to  general  belief,  there  is 
usually  not  much  love  lost  between  parents  and  children 
and  that  especially  little  children  do  not  always  love 
their  parents  in  a  manner  generally  accepted.  On  the 
contrary  they  show  a  marked  dislike  for  one  of  their 
parents.  This  statement  may  sound  very  bold  and 
unfounded,  but  if  you  will  stop  to  think  for  a  moment 
you  will  soon  feel  that  it  contains  a  familiar  note.  Obser- 
vation teaches  that  our  love  for  parents  is  not  innate  and 
spontaneous  and  that  it  follows  the  same  laws  as  that 
among  strangers.  Although  Freud  gave  us  the  true 
psychological  explanation  of  this  conception  the  principle 
of  it  must  have  been  known  from  time  immemorial.  His- 
tory and  every-day  life  demonstrate  it.  We  all  know 
the  fifth  commandment:  Honor  thy  father  and  thy 
mother,  that  thy  days  may  be  long  in  the  land  which 
the  Lord  thy  God  giveth  thee.  Here  we  have  a  direct 
order  to  honor  our  parents  and  judging  by  the  other 
commandments  and  by  our  modern  laws,  it  must  be 
concluded  that  to  neglect  parents  was  just  as  natural  in 
the  Biblical  times  as  were  those  impulses  against  which 
commandments  beginning  with  "Thou  shalt  not"  had  to 
be  imposed.  For  it  is  a  fact  that  there  is  no  necessity  of 
commanding  the  individual  to  realize  his  impulses.  Left 
to  himself  he  would  constantly  try  to  realize  them,  and 
civilization,  so  called,  simply  consists  of  inhibitions 
imposed  upon  the  individual  by  religion  and  society. 
The  more  one  can  inhibit  his  primitive  impulses  the  more 
cultured  he  is,  and  savages  and  children  must  be  taught 
inhibition  to  fit  them  for  society.     To  cite  Freud:  "A 


264  PSYCHANALYSIS 

progressive  renouncement  of  constitutional  impulses, 
the  activity  of  which  afford  the  ego  primary  pleasure, 
seems  to  be  one  of  the  basic  principles  of  human  culture."1 

When  we  enter  into  the  deeper  mental  mechanisms 
of  our  patients  and  investigate  their  love  lives,  we  usually 
find  that  the  little  boy  is  more  attached  to  his  mother  and 
the  little  girl  to  her  father.  In  other  words,  the  first 
woman  a  boy  loves  is  his  mother.  The  little  boy  there- 
fore finds  his  father  in  the  way — he  is  his  rival.  When 
the  father  is  not  at  home  the  little  son  has  no  one  with 
whom  to  share  his  mother's  affection.  He  is  therefore 
angry  and  jealous  of  his  father  and  often  wishes  him 
dead.  One  of  my  patients  vividly  recalls  that  at  the  age 
of  four  years  he  asked  his  mother  whom  she  loved  best 
him  or  his  father,  and  when  she  said  that  she  loved  his 
father  best  he  became  furious  and  cried  for  hours.  Such 
primitive  feelings  help  to  make  up  the  fateful  sum  of 
material  furnished  by  the  psychic  impulse  which  is  formed 
during  the  infantile  period  and  which  is  of  great  impor- 
tance for  the  symptoms  appearing  in  the  later  neurosis. 
I  could  trace  directly  the  symptoms  of  the  cases  that 
I  have  analyzed  to  such  mechanisms.  In  normal  persons 
we  find  the  traces  of  this  early  love  in  the  dreams  of  the 
death  of  near  relatives  especially  the  father.2 

The  sexual  feeling  for  the  mother  and  jealousy  of  the 
father  is  called  by  Freud  the  Oedipus  complex  because 
antiquity  has  furnished  us  with  legendary  material  to 
confirm  this  fact.  To  put  it  in  his  words:  "The  deep 
and  universal  effectiveness  of  these  legends  can  only  be 
explained  by  granting  a  similar  universal  applicability  to 
the  above-mentioned  assumption  in  infantile  psychology."3 


THE    OEDIPUS    COMPLEX  265 

The  legend  referred  to  is  the  drama  King  Oedipus  by 
Sophocles.  Laius,  the  king  of  Thebes,  married  Jocasta. 
After  years  of  childless  marriage  Laius  visited  the  Del- 
phian Apollo  and  prayed  for  a  child.  The  answer  of 
the  god  was  as  follows:  "Your  prayer  has  been  heard 
and  a  son  will  be  given  to  you,  but  you  will  die  at  his 
hand  for  Zeus  decided  to  fulfil  the  curse  of  Pelops  whose 
son  you  have  once  kidnapped."  In  spite  of  the  warning 
the  son  was  born,  but  soon  thereafter  the  child's  feet 
were  pierced  and  tied,  and  he  was  delivered  to  a  faithful 
servant  to  be  exposed  in  the  desert.  The  servant,  how- 
ever, gave  the  child  to  a  Corinthian  shepherd  who  took 
it  to  his  master,  King  Polybus,  who,  being  childless, 
adopted  it  and  called  it  Oedipus,  meaning  swollen  feet. 
When  the  boy  grew  up  into  manhood  he  became  uncertain 
of  his  own  origin  and  consulting  the  oracle  received  the 
following  answer:  "Beware  that  thou  shouldst  not 
murder  thy  father  and  marry  thy  mother."  In  order  to 
avoid  the  fulfilment  of  this  prophecy  Oedipus  at  once 
left  Corinth  and  accidentally  wandered  toward  Thebes- 
On  the  way  he  met  King  Laius  and  struck  him  dead  in  a 
sudden  quarrel.  He  then  came  to  the  gates  of  Thebes 
where  he  solved  the  riddle  of  the  Sphinx  who  barred  his 
way.  As  a  reward  for  this  he  was  elected  king  and  pre- 
sented with  the  hand  of  Jocasta.  He  reigned  in  peace 
for  many  years  and  begot  two  sons  and  two  daughters 
upon  his  unknown  mother  until  a  plague  broke  out  which 
caused  the  Thebans  to  consult  the  oracle.  The  messen- 
gers returned  with  the  advice  that  the  plague  would  stop 
as  soon  as  the  murderer  of  King  Laius  would  be  driven 
from  the  country.     Sophocles  then  develops  the  play  in 


2()6  PSYCHANALYSIS 

a  psychanaJytic  manner  until  the  true  relations  are 
discovered,  namely,  that  Oedipus  killed  his  father  and 
married  his  own  mother.  The  drama  ends  by  Oedipus 
blinding  himself  and  wandering  away  into  voluntary 
exile. 

In  his  characteristic  penetrating  way  Freud  draws 
many  interesting  conclusions  some  of  which  I  shall 
mention.  Oedipus  Tyrannus  is  a  tragedy  of  fate.  Its 
tragic  effect  is  said  to  be  found  in  the  opposition  between 
the  powerful  will  of  the  gods  and  the  futile  resistance  of 
the  human  being  who  is  threatened  with  destruction. 
The  tragedy  teaches  resignation  to  the  will  of  God  and 
confession  of  one's  own  helplessness.  This  tragedy  has 
lately  been  revived  by  Max  Reinhardt  and  had  a  long 
and  successful  run  in  Berlin  and  London.  From  what 
we  have  read,  it  would  seem  that  it  moves  modern  men 
no  less  than  it  moved  the  contemporary  Greek.  In  our 
own  times  one  occasionally  witnesses  a  play  dealing  writh 
the  incest  problem  which  is  as  tremenduously  effective 
as  the  Greek  drama.  I  can  recall  only  one  such  play, 
The  City,  by  Clyde  Fitch.  This  seems  to  indicate  that 
the  explanation  of  this  fact  cannot  lie  merely  in  the  as- 
sumption that  the  effect  of  the  Greek  tragedy  is  based 
upon  the  opposition  between  human  fate  and  human  will, 
but  is  to  be  sought  in  the  peculiar  nature  of  the  material 
by  which  the  opposition  is  shown.  There  must  be  some- 
thing in  us  which  is  prepared  to  recognize  the  compelling 

power  of  fate  in  Oedipus  while  we  justly  condemn  the 
situations  occurring  in  tragedies  of  later  date  as  arbi- 
trary inventions.  Witness,  e.g.,  the  storm  that  has  been 
produced  in  this  country  by  Synge's  Irish  play  "The 


THE    OEDIPUS    COMPLEX  267 

Play-boy  of  the  Western  World,"  which  is  a  veiled  Oedipus 
complex.  Freud  states  that  there  must  be  a  factor 
corresponding  to  this  inner  voice  in  the  story  of  king 
Oedipus.  "His  fate  moves  us  only  for  the  reason  that 
it  might  have  been  ours,  for  the  oracle  has  put  the  same 
curse  upon  us  before  our  birth  as  upon  him.  Perhaps  we 
are  all  destined  to  direct  our  first  sexual  impulses  toward 
our  mothers  and  our  first  hatred  and  violent  wishes 
toward  our  father.  Our  dreams  convince  us  of  it.  King 
Oedipus  who  killed  his  father  and  married  his  mother, 
is  nothing  but  the  realized  wish  of  our  childhood.  But 
more  fortunate  than  he  we  have  since  succeeded,  unless 
we  have  become  psychoneurotics,  in  withdrawing  our 
sexual  impulses  from  our  mothers  and  in  forgetting  our 
jealousy  of  our  fathers.  We  recoil  from  the  person  for 
whom  this  primitive  wish  has  been  fulfilled  with  all  the 
force  of  the  repression  which  these  wishes  have  suffered 
within  us.  By  his  analysis  showing  us  the  guilt  of 
Oedipus  the  poet  urges  us  to  recognize  our  own  inner  self, 
in  which  these  impulses,  even  if  suppressed,  are  still 
present."4 

That  the  Oedipus  legend  originated  in  an  extremely 
old  dream  material  which  consists  of  the  painful  disturb- 
ance of  the  relation  toward  one's  own  parents  by  means 
of  the  first  impulses  of  sexuality,  is  unmistakably  shown 
in  the  very  text  of  Sophocles.  Jocasta,  comforting 
Oedipus,  mentions  to  him  the  dream  which  is  dreamed 
by  so  many  people:  "For  it  has  already  been  the  lot  of 
many  men  in  dreams  to  think  themselves  partners  of 
their  mother's  bed.  But  he  passes  most  easily  through 
life    to    whom    those    circumstances   are  trifles."5     The 


208  PSYCHANALYSIS 

dream  of  having  sexual  intercourse  with  one's  own  mother 
occurred  at  that  time  as  it  does  to-day  to  many  persons 
who  tell  it  with  indignation  and  astonishment.  As  may 
be  understood,  it  is  the  key  to  the  tragedy  and  the  com- 
plement to  the  dream  of  the  death  of  the  father.  The 
story  of  Oedipus  is  the  reaction  of  the  imagination  to 
these  two  typical  dreams  and,  just  as  the  dream  when 
occurring  to  an  adult  is  experienced  with  feelings  of 
resistance,  so  the  legend  must  contain  terror  and  self 
chastisement.  An  uncomprehending  secondary  elabora- 
tion tries  to  make  it  serve  theological  purposes. 

From  my  own  experience  I  can  fully  corroborate 
Freud's  claims.  I  have  on  record  thirty-eight  dreams 
of  sexual  relation  with  one's  own  mother  given  to  me  by 
twenty-one  patients.  These  dreams  were  quite  plain 
and  there  was  very  little  distortion  to  them.  About  half 
of  these  dreamers  reported  these  dreams  before  they  ever 
heard  of  any  Oedipus  complex,  while  the  other  half  told 
about  them  after  I  had  explained  the  mechanism.  They 
all  assured  me  that  they  were  perfectly  aware  of  these 
dreams  and  to  my  question  why  they  had  not  told  me 
before  they  invariably  answered  that  it  was  too  terrible 
and  revolting  a  thing  to  tell,  and  that  the  only  reason 
why  they  told  them  to  me  was  because  they  were  happy 
to  know  they  were  not  the  only  ones  having  such  dreams. 
I  can  say  the  same  of  nineteen  women  who  dreamed  that 
they  had  sexual  relations  with  then  fathers.  I  analyzed 
Oedipus  dreams  in  which  only  the  father  or  the  mother 
was  masked.  Thus  one  of  my  female  homosexuals  told 
me  that  the  only  erotic  dreams  in  which  a  man  played  a 
part  was  one  of  having  had  sexual  intercourse  with  one 


THE    OEDIPUS    COMPLEX  269 

of  our  Governors,  but  on  associating  to  the  dream,  she 
told  me  that  she  was  accustomed  to  refer  to  her  father  as 
the  governor.  As  you  know  the  president,  governor  and 
mayor  in  dreams  usually  means  the  father.6 

Most  of  the  Oedipus  dreams,  however,  usually  show  a 
symbolization  of  the  sexual  act  in  which  the  parents  may 
be  quite  plain.  One  of  my  patients  dreamed  that  he 
climbed  up  a  high  water  tower  on  a  revolving  staircase. 
On  reaching  midway  he  met  his  mother,  who  accompanied 
him  to  the  top.  The  climbing  became  more  and  more 
difficult.  He  had  to  hold  on  very  tightly  to  her  for  fear 
that  they  would  both  fall.  They  finally  reached  the  top 
in  a  very  exhausted  state  where  they  both  laid  down  in 
bed  together  for  a  long  rest.  This  patient  slept  with  his 
mother  until  he  was  eighteen  years  old  and,  from  his 
own  admission,  although  he  entertained  no  conscious 
sexual  feelings  toward  her,  he  wished  on  at  least  a 
few  occasions  that  he  could  marry  her.  To  those  ac- 
quainted with  dream  analysis  this  dream  needs  no  further 
elucidation.7 

A  man  of  thirty-five  years  reported  to  me  the  following 
dream:  "/  dreamt  that  I  was  in  bed  with  my  moilier  and 
as  slie  was  talking  aloud  I  told  her  to  be  quiet  as  I  was  afraid 
that  my  father  who  was  in  tJw  next  room  would  hear  us" 

This  patient  was  treated  for  psychosexual  impotence 
and  this  dream  came  after  unsuccessfully  attempting 
heterosexual  intercourse.  He  was  his  mother's  favorite 
and  owing  to  the  fact  that  his  father  was  a  psychopathic 
individual  who  abused  and  terrified  his  family  he  hated 
him  and  was  much  attached  to  his  mother.  Whenever 
his  father  went  on  a  rampage  his  mother  would  lock  herself 


270  PSYCHANALYSIS 

in  a  room  with  him,  and  they  often  lived  through  in 
reality  the  experience  described  in  the  dream.  This  was 
also  the  reason  for  his  sleeping  with  his  mother  up  to  the 
age  of  ten  years.  Disappointed  in  her  husband  she 
lavished  all  her  affection  on  her  son  who  supplied  her 
with  the  love  she  craved.  The  patient  stated  that  for 
years  he  was  subject  to  nightmares  showing  almost  the 
same  content  as  the  above-mentioned  dream. 

To  understand  the  full  significance  of  this  dream  it  will 
be  necessary  to  review  a  few  psychological  facts. 

As  stated  above  we  are  all  destined  to  direct  our  first 
sexual  impulses  to  our  mothers.  The  first  woman  loved 
is  one's  own  mother.  It  is  the  mother  who  impresses  on 
the  mind  the  woman-image  which  remains  as  a  permanent 
standard  for  the  female  ideal.  Normally  a  repression 
takes  place  and  the  boy  gradually  projects  his  love  to 
strangers.  Investigation  shows  that  the  love  life  of  an 
individual  begins  at  a  very  early  age  and  as  this  progresses 
the  love  for  one's  mother  gradually  fades  from  conscious- 
ness. In  the  unconscious  it  remains  forever  and  acts 
as  a  constant  guide  in  the  future  selection  of  a  woman.8 
Every  woman  in  compared  to  the  mother-image  and 
cceteris  paribus,  the  closer  the  resemblance  the  stronger 
the  woman  attracts  us.  This  may  shade  from  the  normal 
to  the  abnormal.  As  examples  I  can  cite  the  following 
cases: 

A  very  cultured  man  was  attracted  only  by  very  stout 
servants.     No  other  type  of  woman  appealed  to  him 
Analysis  showed  that  his  first  sexual  impulses  were  aroused 
by  a  servant  girl  of  that  type  who  took  the  place  of  his 
mother. 


THE    OEDIPUS    COMPLEX  271 

A  refined  married  woman  of  twenty-four  years  suffered 
from  psycho-sexual  frigidity,  but  was  sexually  excited 
whenever  she  saw  a  lame  man.  This  was  due  to  an  identi- 
fication with  her  mother  who  had  an  illicit  love  affair  with 
a  man  when  she  was  three  or  four  years  old.  Like  a  great 
many  grown-ups  her  mother  considered  her  little  girl  an 
unthinking  being  and  took  no  pains  to  conceal  anything 
from  her.  When  her  paramour  sustained  a  fracture  of  his 
leg  and  she  found  it  necessary  to  make  frequent  calls  on 
him  she  took  her  little  daughter  with  her  so  as  to  avoid 
gossip.  Although  what  she  witnessed  apparently  made  no 
impression  on  her  at  the  time  it  nevertheless  acted  as  a 
sexual  trauma  and  formed  an  association  between  sex 
and  lameness.9  This  was  also  determined  by  the  fact  that 
at  a  later  age  this  lame  man  took  the  place  of  her  own 
father  by  marrying  her  widowed  mother. 

A  young  married  woman  who  is  dominated  by  a  verit- 
able prostitution  complex  carried  on  illicit  relations  with 
men  while  she  lived  with  her  husband.  Psychanalysis 
showed  that  she  was  an  only  daughter  and  although  her 
father's  pet  she  saw  very  little  of  him  during  her  early 
childhood  as  his  affairs  took  him  away  from  home.  As 
far  as  her  memory  reached  she  recalled  witnessing  unholy 
loves  between  her  mother  and  "  strange  men."  She  herself 
married  a  man  who  not  only  belongs  to  the  same  type  as  her 
father,  but  who  even  follows  her  father's  vocation.  She 
thus  identified  herself  with  her  mother  in  every  respect. 

I  could  quote  many  more  cases,*  but  these  will  suffice 
to  show  the  unconscious  parental  influence.  Such  in- 
fluences are  found  in  every  person  and  although  they  are 

*  Most  of  the  cases  described  by  Mantegazza  as  Idiogamists  probably 
belong  to  this  category:    Zeitschrift  f.  Sexualwissenschaft,  p.  223. 


272  PSYCHANALYSIS 

usually  quite  harmless  they  sometimes  act  perniciously. 
This  is  particularly  true  of  only  or  favorite  children  who 
are  overburdened  with  love.  They  are  not  allowed  to 
follow  the  different  stages  of  the  psychosexual  evolution 
and  their  libido  remains  fixed  on  the  mother.10  The  result 
of  such  a  process  may  be  psychosexual  impotence.  By 
preventing  the  boy  from  projecting  his  love  to  strangers 
there  results  an  unconscious  incestuous  fixation  on  the 
mother  which  then  acts  as  an  inhibition  to  sexual  relations 
with  other  women.11 

Let  us  return  to  the  above-mentioned  dream.  From 
what  we  know  of  dreams  we  may  say  that  those  which  are 
accompanied  by  fear  are  of  a  sexual  nature.  The  fear  is 
the  converted  libido  and  takes  the  place  of  the  distortion 
usually  found  in  other  dreams.  In  other  words  the  dream 
represents  a  repressed  wish  to  sleep  with  his  mother  and 
the  converted  libido  is  masked  behind  the  fear  for  the 
father.  His  father  was  furious  whenever  he  found  him 
sleeping  with  his  mother  and  our  patient  dreaded  lest  he 
should  be  detected  by  his  father.  The  dream  repeats  the 
same  state  of  mind  and  thus  gives  us  the  key  to  his  neuro- 
sis. By  sleeping  with  his  mother  to  so  late  an  age  the 
incestuous  feelings  were  kept  alive  and  fixed  on  her,  but 
as  he  grew  older  he  energetically  defended  himself  against 
them  and  finally  succeeded  in  repressing  them  from  con- 
sciousness. As  a  reaction  to  these  unconscious  desires 
he  became  extremely  moral  and  religious  and  avoided 
anything  sexual.  At  the  age  of  twenty-eight  he  attempted 
coitus  for  the  first  time  and  failed.  This  failure  was  re- 
peated at  every  subsequent  attempt.  He  could  not  accom- 
plish the  sexual  act  because  of  the  sexual  fixation  on  the 
mother.     Every  woman  unconsciously  recalled  his  mother 


THE    OEDIPUS    COMPLEX  273 

and,  because  of  the  marked  repression  coitus  was  naturally 
impossible.  This  was  also  constellated  by  his  unconscious 
fear  of  his  father.  The  patient  was  cured  of  his  impotence 
as  soon  as  these  mechanisms  were  laid  bare  and  explained 
to  him. 

Conscious  incestuous  feelings  and  experiences  in  adult 
life  are  not  as  rare  as  one  would  imagine.  This  subject 
has  been  discussed  by  Krafft-Ebing,  Bloch,  Havelock 
Ellis  and  others.  My  own  observations  in  this  regard 
taught  me  that  sexual  feelings  and  fancies  about  one's 
parents,  sisters  and  brothers  are  not  only  extremely 
common  in  early  life,  but  that  they  also  exist  later.  Nor 
must  it  be  imagined  that  whenever  it  is  found  we  deal 
with  defective  persons.  The  individual  circumstances 
must  always  be  considered.  Havelock  Ellis12  explains 
the  abhorence  of  incest  on  the  basis  of  familiarity.  He 
states  that  "  The  normal  failure  of  the  pairing  instinct  to 
manifest  itself  in  the  case  of  brothers  and  sisters  or  of 
boys  and  girls  brought  up  together  from  infancy  is  a 
merely  negative  phenomenon  due  to  the  inevitable 
absence  under  those  circumstances  of  the  conditions  which 
evoke  the  pairing  impulse"  (p.  205).  ''Passion  between 
brothers  and  sisters  is,  indeed,  by  no  means  so  rare  as  is 
sometimes  supposed,  and  it  may  be  very  strong,  but  it  is 
usually  aroused  by  the  aid  of  those  conditions  which  are 
normally  required  for  the  appearance  of  passion,  more 
especially  by  the  unfamiliarity  caused  by  long  separation" 
(p.  206).  I  agree  with  Havelock  Ellis  as  far  as  he  goes, 
but  it  seems  to  me  that  unfamiliarity  plays  only  a  sub- 
ordinate part  in  the  promotion  of  certain  feelings  between 
brothers  and  sisters.     Unfamiliarity  does  not  necessarily 

18 


271  PSYCHANALYSIS 

cause  attraction  between  strangers  of  the  opposite  sexes, 
but  long  separation,  especially  when  occurring  since  early 
life,  is  sure  to  produce  a  strong  fascination  between 
brothers  and  sisters.  This  is  due  to  the  repressed  Oedipus 
complex.  As  was  said  above,  every  woman  that  later 
comes  into  the  individual's  life  is  unconsciously  compared 
to  the  mother  image  in  our  unconscious.  It  is  quite 
obvious  that  the  sister  fits  into  this  image  much  better 
than  any  other  woman.  Who  resembles  the  mother 
more  than  the  daughter?  Besides,  the  daughter  has 
the  advantage  over  the  mother  of  youth  and  beauty.  In 
this  connection  I  would  like  to  give  an  incident  related 
to  me  by  a  colleague: 

He  came  to  this  country  from  Germany  at  the  age  of 
fourteen  years  having  left  at  home  a  sister  one  and  a  half 
years  his  junior.  Years  later  he  visited  an  exhibition 
in  the  Grand  Central  Palace  in  New  York  City  and  was 
strongly  fascinated  by  a  young  lady  he  saw  there.  The 
attraction  was  so  strong  that  he  lost  interest  in  the  exhibits 
and  followed  her  around  until  she  left  the  place.  Nor  did 
this  fascination  end  here.  He  told  me  that  for  months 
he  acted  like  a  man  in  love  and  for  years  he  measured 
every  woman  by  his  "Grand  Central  Girl."  He  returned 
to  his  native  city  after  having  been  eighteen  years  in 
America  and  as  soon  as  he  saw  his  younger  sister  the 
thought  flashed  through  his  mind,  "Here  is  my  Grand 
Central  Girl."  There  was,  indeed,  a  remarkable  resem- 
blance between  his  sister  and  the  unknown  young  woman 
with  whom  he  fell  in  love  in  America.  His  sister  was 
the  picture  of  his  mother. 

Moreover  in  real  life,  daughters  often  take  the  place  of 


THE    OEDIPUS    COMPLEX  275 

their  mothers.  I  know  of  a  few  cases  where  men  first 
loved  the  mothers  and  then  switched  over  to  the  daughters. 
The  daily  press  sometimes  reports  such  cases. 18 

It  is  in  the  psychoses,  however,  that  one  sees  the  marked 
influence  of  the  Oedipus  complex.  Here  the  complex 
usually  comes  to  the  surface  in  the  form  of  symptoms, 
usually  hallucinations  and  delusions,  and  the  analysis  can 
generally  trace  these  automatisms  to  early  repressed 
feelings  and  experiences.  The  following  cases  will  serve 
as  paradigms: 

Case  I. — V,  twenty-nine  years  old,  suffers  from  the  paranoid  form 
of  dementia  precox.  He  hears  voices  accusing  him  of  having  had 
sexual  relations  with  his  mother.  Analysis  showed  that  as  a  boy  he 
entertained  sexual  fancies  about  his  mother.  He  often  looked 
through  the  keyhole  when  she  took  her  bath. 

Case  II. — Mrs.  F.,  a  married  woman  of  twenty-eight  years,  is  a 
paranoid  precox.  For  more  than  a  year  she  has  been  laughing  and 
talking  to  herself  uttering  words  like  "  clean,  never,  respectable,  not 
at  all,  none."  When  questioned  she  states  that  she  hears  voices  who 
accuse  her  of  having  been  "too  intimate  with  her  father  and  brother" 
and  the  words  uttered  are  only  answers  to  her  imaginary  accusers. 
They  read  as  follows:  I  am  clean.  I  never  did  such  terrible  things. 
I  am  respectable.  It  is  not  at  all  true  that  I  had  sexual  relations 
with  my  father  and  brother." 

Case  III. — With  Dr.  H.  Valentine  Wildman  I  have  recently  com- 
mitted a  young  man  to  the  River  Crest  Sanatorium.  This  patient 
was  paranoid  and  his  main  delusions  were  fairly  well  systematized. 
They  were  directed  against  his  mother.  He  called  her  vile  names  and 
accused  her  of  having  made  sexual  advances  to  him.  The  following 
remarks  pointing  to  a  retrospective  falsification  contain  the  nucleus 
of  his  delusions:  "I  remember  when  I  was  a  kid,  she  (mother)  looked 
at  my  eyes  and  then  paced  the  floor  as  if  to  say  'you  are  for  me'  and 
since  then  she  wanted  to  make  me  her  lover."  The  history  of  the 
case  shows  the  typical  mechanisms  of  paranoia,  that  is,  there  was 
fixation  in  narcism  and  mother  love  (he  was  the  mother's  favorite), 


276  PSYCHANALYSI8 

defenoe  against  homosexual  wish  phantasies,  then  failure  of  repres- 
sion, as  manifested  in  some  homosexual  experiences  and  delusions  of 
persecution.** 

Now  it  may  be  asked  whether  children  show  by  their 
behavior  any  indication  of  the  Oedipus  complex  and 
whether  fathers  realize  consciously  that  their  sons  are 
their  rivals.  Anamneses  taken  from  normal  and  abnormal 
persons  answer  these  questions  in  the  affirmative.  Also 
the  works  of  Freud,  Bleuler,  Jung,  Putnam,  Ferenczi, 
Stekel,  Abraham,  Rank,  Jones, u  and  others,  show  beyond 
any  doubt  that  this  is  the  case.  To  quote  Bleuler,  "  After 
our  attention  had  been  called  to  it  we  found  this  Oedipus 
complex  more  and  more  frequently.  It  is  also  an  im- 
portant factor  in  the  selection  of  lovers  among  normal  and 
abnormal  persons."16  I  have  collected  many,  many  facts. 
Some  I  have  personally  observed  and  some  were  given  to 
me  by  reliable  colleagues  and  friends,  showing  that  beyond 
any  doubt  small  children  often  wish  to  replace  the  parent 
of  their  own  sex.  A  mother  told  me  that  her  bright  and 
healthy  little  boy  of  two  years  is  very  jealous  of  his  father, 
and  shows  it  on  every  occasion.  Seeing  her  talking  and  sit- 
ting next  to  her  husband  he  ran  to  her  and  pulled  her  away, 
exclaiming,  "No  Mami  talk  Daddy,  sit  down  talk  Baby." 
A  brilliant  little  boy  of  three  years,  hearing  that  he  will  sleep 
with  his  mother  because  his  father  was  going  to  stay  away 
for  the  night,  expressed  his  great  pleasure  to  his  mother,  and 
added,  "Let  us  play  that  we  are  married.  I'll  call  you  Mary 
and  you  call  me  John"  (names  of  parents).  Later,  when  he 
entered  his  mother's  sleeping  room,  he  said,  "Here  comes  your 
husband."  A  little  girl  of  three  and  one-half  years  on  being 
punished  by  her  mother  exclaimed  in  her  childish  way,  "Go 


THE    OEDIPUS    COMPLEX  277 

away  to  Susie  (her  dead  sister) ,  I  can  be  papa's  Mama  (mean- 
ing his  wife,  as  her  father  calls  her  mother  'mama')-"  An- 
other little  girl  of  about  four  years  kissed  her  father  and  kept 
on  repeating,  "I  love  you  so  much,  papa.  Let's  go  to  the 
Bronx  and  never  come  home  to  mama."  And  on  being 
questioned  she  admitted  that  she  did  not  love  her  mother. 

It  is  not  uncommon  for  parents  to  be  jealous  of  the  love 
shown  by  the  other  parent  for  the  child.  A  glaring  ex- 
ample of  this  kind  was  reported  to  me  by  a  patient  re- 
ferred to  me  by  Dr.  Coriat  of  Boston.  Her  husband  was 
a  very  prominent  business  man,  but  somewhat  psycho- 
pathic. She  was  very  much  attached  to  her  only  son  and 
the  more  she  loved  him  the  more  he  was  hated  by  the 
father.  The  latter  openly  expressed  his  jealousy  and  ha- 
tred for  his  son  and  treated  him  most  cruelly  whenever  he 
could  do  so.  This  feeling  continued  for  more  than  thirty 
years  until  the  father  died,  and  was  the  cause  of  much 
unhappiness. 

In  his  study  on  incest  among  savages17  Freud  showed 
that  the  incest  shyness  is  an  infantile  trait  and  in  striking 
accord  with  the  psychic  life  of  the  neurotic.  Psych- 
analysis  teaches  that  the  first  sexual  object  of  the  boy  is  of 
an  incestuous  prohibitive  nature  directed  against  the 
mother  or  sister;  it  also  shows  us  how  the  developing  in- 
dividual frees  himself  from  these  feelings.  The  neurotic 
individual,  however,  regularly  represents  a  fragment  of 
psychic  infantilism.  He  is  either  unable  to  free  himself 
from  the  infantile  relations  of  psychosexuality,  or  he 
returned  to  them.  It  is  for  that  reason  that  the  incestuous 
fixations  of  the  libido  continue  to  play  a  great  part  in  his 
unconscious  psychic  life. 


278  PSYCHANALYSIS 

References 

1.  Sammlung  klcine  Schriften  zur  Neurosenlehre,  Zweite  Fogel. 

2.  Freud:  The   Interpretation   of   Dreams.     The   Macmillan   Co., 
New  York,  and  George  Allen  Co.,  London. 

3.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  221. 

4.  L.  c,  p.  223. 

5.  Act  IV,  Sc.  3,  translated  by  Clark. 

6.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  246. 

7.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  246.     On  Stairway  Dreams. 

8.  Cf.  Chap.  XI. 

9.  For  the  mechanism  of  such  traumas  see  Freud:  Selected  papers 
on  Hysteria,  p.  159. 

10.  Cf.  Chap.  XI. 

11.  Ferenczi:  Analytische  Deutung  und  Behandlung  der  psycho- 
sexuellen  Impotenz  beim  Manne.  Psychiatrisch-neurologische  Woch- 
enschrift,  1908,  No.  35.  See  also  the  works  of  Stekel  and  Steiner: 
Die  Psychischen  Storungen  der  Mannlichen  Potenz.  Deuticke,  Wien. 

12.  Sexual  Selection  in  Man,  p.  204. 

13.  Those  who  are  interested  in  the  problem  may  read  an  excellent 
paper  on  the  subject  by  Freud:  Die  Inzestscheu  der  Wilden;  Imago, 
Heft  1.  Also  Totem  und  Tabu  (translation  in  preparation),  p.  16, 
Heller,  Wien. 

14.  For  full  particulars  of  these  mechanisms,  see  Chap.  VII. 

15.  See  especially,  "The  Oepdius  Complex  as  an  Explanation  of 
Hamlet's  Mystery,"  Amer.  Jour,  of  Psychology,  Jan.,  1910. 

16.  Dementia  Praecox  oder  Gruppe  der  Schizophrenien,  p.  344. 
Deuticke,  Leipzig  u.  Wien,  1911. 

17.  Freud:  L.  c. 


CHAPTER   XI 
THE  ONLY  OR  FAVORITE  CHILD  IN  ADULT  LIFE 

Fixation  on  early  parental  images;  the  psychology  of 

the  mother-in-law 

Very  little  attention  has  been  given  to  the  problem  of 
the  only  child,  and  the  little  literature  we  have  at  our 
disposal  deals  mainly  with  the  superficial  and  general 
aspects  of  the  question.  Neter,  who  has  written  an  excel- 
lent pamphlet  on  the  subject,1  gives  a  very  good  descrip- 
tion of  the  only  child's  attributes,  but  he  does  not  enter 
into  the  deeper  psychological  elements.  Moreover,  no 
attempt  has  been  made  outside  of  the  Freudian  school2 
to  follow  those  children  into  adult  life  and  to  trace  the 
individual  influence  at  play  in  their  adjustment  to  environ- 
ments. This  can  be  readily  understood  when  we  remem- 
ber that  very  little  has  been  done  in  child  psychology  in 
general  and  that  only  few  psychologists  are  at  present 
occupying  themselves  with  the  subject. 

Stimulated  by  the  works  of  Freud3  and  Jung4  I  have 
investigated  the  subject  from  the  psychanalytical  side 
and  shall  endeavor  to  present  some  of  the  results.  But 
before  proceeding  to  do  so  it  will  be  necessary  to  orient 
ourselves  on  some  of  the  psychological  principles  that 
form  a  part  of  the  discussion. 

In  his  famous  essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding, 
Locke   tells   us  that   the   child's   mind  is  essentially   a 

279 


280  P8TCHANALYSIS 

tabvla  rasa,  a  tablet  upon  which  nothing  is  written,  and 
that  all  knowledge  rests  on  experience.  Psychanalysis 
fully  demonstrates  Lock's  empiricism,  and  confining 
ourselves  to  the  question  of  parental  influences  and  rela- 
tionships we  may  say  that  every  individual's  mind  pos- 
sesses certain  stereotype  plates  or  models,  as  it  were, 
which  are  the  result  of  mental  impressions  produced  by 
the  parents  during  childhood.  Thus  a  father  image5  and 
a  mother  image  remain  permanently  engraved  in  the 
mind  and  act  as  standards  for  estimation  of  men  and 
women  that  later  enter  into  this  person's  life.  It  is  not 
difficult  to  show  that  our  behavior  toward  our  fellow 
beings  depends  mostly  on  our  relations  to  our  parents.  In 
other  words  we  unconsciously  endeavor  to  fit  every 
stranger  into  one  of  our  latent  parental  images  and  our 
likes  and  dislikes  depend  in  a  great  measure  on  the  success 
or  failure  of  such  correlation.  Further  investigation 
shows  that  children  do  not  always  love  their  parents  as  is 
commonly  supposed,  but  very  often  hate  one  of  them. 
The  first  woman  the  little  boy  loves  is  her  mother,  and 
the  first  man  the  little  girl  loves  is  her  father.  The  little 
boy  idolizes  his  mother  and  supplies  her  with  that  part  of 
poetic  love  which  she  no  longer  gets  from  her  husband. 
The  mother  calls  her  little  boy  sweetheart  and  tries  to 
realize  in  him  her  ideal  of  the  man.  The  same  thing  takes 
place  between  the  little  girl  and  her  father.  Normally, 
however,  these  parental  ideals  vanish  with  the  advancing 
age,  when  the  growing  child  begins  to  project  his  love  on 
strangers.  The  boy  then  no  longer  thinks  that  his 
mother  is  the  prettiest  and  loveliest  woman  in  the  world, 
but  he  evinces  an  interest  in  other  persons  of  the  opposite 


THE    ONLY    OR    FAVORITE    CHILD    IN    ADULT    LIFE       281 

sex.  The  deflection  of  love  from  the  mother  may  also  be 
furthered  by  the  appearance  of  a  little  brother,  who  claims 
a  part  of  his  mother's  love  and  attention.  However, 
this  absence  of  the  mother  ideal  is  only  apparent.  It  is 
not  eliminated,  but  repressed  into  the  unconscious  and 
there  it  continues  to  exert  its  influence  throughout  the 
whole  life  of  the  individual.  Psychanalysis  of  normal 
persons  shows  beyond  any  doubt  the  enormous  influence 
of  unconscious  parental  complexes.  It  explains  the 
important  mechanism  of  transference6  as  well  as  many  of 
the  peculiarities  of  the  love  life.7 

Recently  I  was  consulted  by  a  young  girl  of  twenty-one 
years  who  was  said  to  have  become  nervous  as  a  result 
of  a  disagreement  with  her  mother.  She  was  in  love  with 
a  man  of  forty-six  years  to  whom  her  mother  strongly 
objected,  not  only  on  account  of  the  marked  difference  in 
their  ages,  but  because  the  man  was  considered  mentally 
abnormal.  During  our  conversation  she  remarked  that 
her  mother  had  always  been  in  her  way  and  by  way  of 
explanation  she  stated  that  her  mother  was  jealous  of  her 
and  that  when  she  was  younger  she  hated  to  have  her 
mother  go  along  when  she  went  out  with  her  father.  "I 
always  looked  upon  her  as  a  stranger,"  she  said.  She 
idolized  her  father  who  is  her  ideal  in  every  respect, 
although  he  is  a  paranoiac  and  has  been  for  years  in  an 
insane  asylum.  She  surprised  me  when  she  told  me  that 
there  is  as  marked  a  difference  in  the  ages  of  her  father 
and  mother  as  there  is  in  her  own  and  her  fiance's  ages. 
Indeed,  all  the  features  of  the  case  unmistakably  pointed 
to  an  identification  with  her  mother  and  an  unconscious 
desire  to  get  her  father  ideal.     Such  cases  are  not  at  all 


'JS'J  PSYCHANALYSIS 

uncommon,  I  have  given  some  in  the  preceding  chapter 
and  could  cite  many  more. 

From  what  has  just  been  said  it  can  be  readily  under- 
stood that  such  parental  influences  may  often  be  strong 
enough  to  inhibit  materially  the  individual's  relations  to 
the  other  sex.  Thus,  too  much  and  prolonged  affection  on 
the  part  of  the  mother  is  apt  to  cause  an  undue  conscious 
or  unconscious  attachment  to  the  parents,  and  thus  pre- 
vent the  child  from  going  through  the  various  stages  of 
its  psychosexual  development.  We  know  that  the  sexual 
impulse  of  childhood  is  autoerotic  or  objectless.8  The 
child  knows  no  other  sexual  object  than  himself  and  gets 
his  gratification  through  the  erogenous  zones  of  his  own 
body.  As  it  grows  older  we  have  the  so-called  latency 
period,  during  which  the  greater  part  of  the  sexual  excita- 
tion is  utilized  for  aims  other  than  sexual,  viz.,  for  the 
formation  of  social  feelings  and  the  future  sexual  barriers. 
Between  autoerotism  and  the  object  love  there  is  an  inter- 
mediate stage  which  has  been  designated  as  narcism. 
Freud  tells  us  that  every  stage  of  development  of  the 
psychosexual  life  offers  a  possibility  for  "fixation"  which 
may  result  in  a  type  of  character.  Thus  we  know  that 
fixation  in  narcism  may  cause  paranoia9  or  homosexuality, 
and  that  fixation  in  autoerotism  may  lay  the  foundation 
for  dementia  prsecox.  By  giving  the  child  too  much  love, 
mothers  often  prolong  or  cause  a  fixation  in  the  various 
stages  mentioned.  This  naturally  occurs  very  often  in 
only  children,  who,  having  no  one  with  whom  to  share  their 
parents'  affection,  are  overburdened  with  love.  The  same 
takes  place  in  favorite  children  who  are  subjected  to  the 
same  conditions  as  only  children  during  the  impressionable 


THE    ONLY    OR   FAVORITE    CHILD    IN    ADULT    LIFE       283 

period  of  their  existence.  Since  the  fall  of  1908  I  have 
examined  400  only  or  favorite  children,  and  my  findings 
may  be  divided  into  (a)  general  and  (6)  specific. 

(a)  Whether  burdened  by  Jwredity  or  not  the  adult  only 
child  usually  shows  one  prominent  feature,  namely,  he  is  a 
very  poor  competitor  in  the  struggle  for  existence.  Hav- 
ing been  carefully  reared  and  constantly  watched  by  his 
loving  mother,  he  remains  forever  "mama's  boy."  He  is 
devoid  of  those  qualities  which  characterize  the  real  boy. 
He  lacks  independence,  self-confidence  and  the  practical 
skill  which  the  average  boy  acquires  through  competition 
with  other  boys. 

Owing  to  the  fact  that  the  only  boy  constantly  asso- 
ciates with  grown-ups  he  is  usually  precocious  even  in 
childhood,  and  as  he  grows  older  he  finds  it  very  hard  to 
associate  with  persons  of  his  own  age.  I  know  an  only 
boy  of  nineteen  years  who  has  not  a  single  friend.  He  is 
practically  asocial.  He  wishes  only  to  associate  with  per- 
sons much  older  than  himself  and  cannot  adapt  himself  to 
the  society  of  young  people  because  they  "bore"  him. 
Some  time  ago  I  was  consulted  about  another  only  boy, 
seven  years  old,  because,  as  his  mother  put  it,  he  did  not 
get  along  with  other  children  and  was  a  real  blase.  He 
was  not  interested  in  anything.  Toys,  pets,  books,  etc., 
that  would  have  been  sufficient  to  delight  the  hearts  of  a 
dozen  children  had  absolutely  no  charm  for  him.  He  was 
in  constant  need  of  new  excitements  and  as  they  could  not 
be  supplied  quickly  enough  he  was  unhappy  and  morose. 

The  only  child  is  usually  spoiled  and  coddled  because 
the  parents  gratify  all  his  whims  and  have  not  the  heart 
to  be  severe  with  or  punish  him  when  necessary.     This 


284  PSYCHANALYSIS 

has  its  evil  consequences  in  adult  life,  for  the  slightest  de- 
preciation,  hardly  noticeable  by  the  average  person,  is 
enough  to  throw  him  into  a  fit  of  depression  and  rage  last- 
ing for  days  and  even  for  weeks.  An  only  daughter 
attempted  suicide  because  her  best  friend  received  more 
attention  than  she  at  a  social  gathering. 

It  is  due  to  the  undivided  attention  and  abnormal  love 
that  the  only  child  gets  from  his  parents  that  he  develops 
into  a  confirmed  egotist.  He  is  never  neglected  in  favor 
of  sisters  and  brothers.  He  is  the  sole  ruler  of  the  house- 
hold and  his  praises  are  constantly  sung.  It  is,  therefore, 
no  wonder  that  the  only  child  becomes  vain  and  one-sided 
and  develops  an  exaggerated  opinion  of  himself.  In  later 
life  he  is  extremely  conceited,  jealous  and  envious.  He 
begrudges  the  happiness  of  friends  and  acquaintances  and 
he  is  therefore  shunned  and  disliked.*  A  favorite  son, 
a  bachelor  of  sixty-two  years  who  was  a  wealthy  retired 
merchant,  told  me  that  whenever  there  was  a  rise  in  the 
market  he  suffered  from  severe  depression  and  fits  of  envy, 
simply  because  he  knew  that  some  of  his  friends  would 
make  money.  He  himself  had  no  personal  interest  in  the 
market.  Such  qualities  are  surely  not  conducive  to 
happiness,  and  it  is  not  at  all  surprising  that  almost  all 
such  children  are  selfish,  unhappy  and  morose. 

(6)  The  specific  findings  are  of  still  greater  interest. 
Of  the  400  cases  observed  there  were  172  men  and  228 
women.  Their  ages  ranged  from  eighteen  to  sixty-eight 
years.     The  morbid  manifestations  were  as  follows: 

*  A  typical  example  is  Joseph  of  the  Bible,  having  been  his  mother's 
only  son  (Rachel  died  during  the  birth  of  Benjamin)  and  his  father's 
favorite,  he  was  despised  and  hated  by  his  half-brothers. 


THE    ONLY    OR   FAVORITE    CHILD    IN   ADULT   LIFE       285 

The  predominant  feature  in  about  36  per  cent,  of  my 
cases  was  the  abnormal  sex  life.  Most  of  them  sought 
treatment  for  homosexuality,  psychic  impotence  (men)  and 
sexual  anesthesia  (women) ;  there  were  also  some  exhibition- 
ists, voyeurs,  sadists  and  masochists.  About  18  per  cent, 
suffered  from  the  various  types  of  dementia  prsecox.  The 
rest  represented  the  different  forms  of  the  psychoneuroses. 

No  statistical  conclusions  should  be  drawn  from  these 
figures  as  most  of  these  patients  came  or  were  sent  to  me 
for  treatment  because  they  suffered  from  psychoneuroses 
or  from  the  other  maladies  enumerated  above.  They 
show,  however,  the  marked  prevalence  of  only  or  favorite 
children  in  these  classes.  Bearing  in  mind  our  psych- 
analytic  knowledge  of  sex  this  is  not  at  all  surprising. 
The  child  is  born  with  the  germs  of  sexuality  and  during 
the  first  years  of  its  life  is  polymorphous  perverse.  That 
is,  if  an  adult  should  manifest  any  of  the  sexual  activities 
that  we  see  in  the  child  he  would  be  considered  perverse. 
But  as  the  child  grows  older  most  of  these  perversions 
undergo  repression  and  the  rest  are  subjugated  to  the 
primacy  of  the  genitals  which  serve  the  purpose  of  pro- 
creation.10 It  is  quite  obvious  that  abnormal  love  in 
early  life  hinders  the  normal  sexual  evolution.  It  either 
keeps  alive  or  later  revives  some  of  the  early  sexual 
activities.  The  boy  cannot  transfer  his  libido  on  other 
women  because  his  mother  stands  in  his  way.  As  a  rule 
this  is  accomplished  quite  innocently  under  the  guise  of 
maternal  care.  Such  mothers  discourage  social  inter- 
course with  the  opposite  sex  because  they  wish  to  preserve 
their  son's  purity,  etc.  A  number  of  my  homosexual 
patients  told  me  that  their  mothers  were  actually  jealous 


280  PSYCHANALYSIS 

of  every  woman  with  whom  they  chanced  to  come  in 

contact  ami  behaved  exactly  as  if  they  were  confronted 
with  a  rival.  No  one  is  good  enough  for  such  children. 
At  least  that  is  what  the  parents  think.  This,  by  the  way, 
is  one  of  the  secrets  of  mothers-in-law.  They  uncon- 
sciously want  their  sons  for  themselves  and  are  jealous 
of  every  other  woman.  It  is  a  sex  jealousy  pure  and 
simple.*    The  majority  of  only  children  do  not  marry  at 

*  The  deeper  reasons,  however,  lying  at  the  basis  of  the  hostility 
between  the  proverbial  mother-in-law  and  her  son-in-law  are  ex- 
plained by  Freud.  (Totem  und  Tabu,  p.  15,  Heller,  Leipzig  and  Wien.) 
He  first  shows  that  among  savages  the  world  over  there  exist  very 
stringent  laws  against  any  familiarity  with  one's  mother-in-law.  The 
son-in-law  and  mother-in-law  are  forced  by  the  tribal  laws  to  shun 
each  other.  They  must  run  away  or  hide  when  they  meet  by  chance. 
In  civilized  communities  where,  to  the  regret  of  many,  there  are  no 
such  laws,  it  is  extremely  common  to  find  very  strained,  not  to  say 
hostile,  feelings  between  mother-in-law  and  son-in-law.  Freud  uses 
a  term  coined  by  Bleuler  to  describe  the  feeling  between  mother-in- 
law  and  son.  He  thinks  that  the  relation  between  them  may  be 
designated  as  "ambivalent,"  i.  e.,  it  is  made  up  of  both  affectionate 
and  hostile  feelings.  Some  of  these  feelings  are  quite  clear.  Thus, 
the  mother-in-law  dislikes  to  relinquish  her  daughter  to  a  stranger 
whom  she  suspects,  and  shows  a  tendency  to  assume  a  domineering 
attitude  which  she  became  accustomed  to  in  her  own  home.  The 
son-in-law,  on  the  other  hand,  is  determined  to  resent  any  subordina- 
tion to  the  will  of  a  stranger.  He  is  jealous  of  all  persons  who  once 
possessed  his  wife's  love  and,  what  is  more,  he  dislikes  to  have  his 
illusion  of  sexual  overestimation  disturbed.  Such  disturbance  mostly 
emanates  from  the  mother-in-law,  who  reminds  him  of  his  wife  because 
of  many  common  features  between  them,  but  who  lacks  all  the  attrac- 
tions of  youth,  beauty  and  psychic  freshness  which  give  value  to  his 
wife. 

Added  to  that  there  are  unconscious  motives.  Whenever  the 
psychosexual  needs  of  the  woman  are  to  be  gratified  in  marriage  or 
in  family  life  she  is  always  threatened  by  the  danger  of  lack  of  grati- 
fication  through  a  premature  cessation  of  the  marital  relations  or 


THE    ONLY    OR    FAVORITE    CHILD    IN    ADULT    LIFE       287 

all  or  they  marry  some  near  relative  whom  they  uncon- 
sciously identify  with  their  parent  image.  The  probable 
average  of  my  patients'  ages  was  thirty-four  years,  but 
only  ninety-three  out  of  the  400  had  been  married. 
Most  of  them  remained  old  maids  and  bachelors. 

through  the  uneventl'ulness  of  her  emotional  life.  The  ageing  mother 
protects  herself  against  it  by  living,  as  it  were,  in  her  children.  It  is 
said  that  one  remains  young  with  one's  children.  This  is  really  the 
most  valuable  psychic  gain  accruing  to  the  parents  from  their  children. 
This  living  through  the  daughter  proceeds  in  the  mother  to  an  extent 
that  she  falls  in  love  with  the  man  her  daughter  loves,  which,  in 
pronounced  cases,  leads  to  severe  forms  of  neurotic  disturbance 
brought  on  by  the  violent  psychic  conflicts.  A  tendency  to  love  her 
son-in-law  is  frequently  observed  in  the  mother-in-law  and  either 
this  feeling  alone  or  its  contrary  emotion  allies  itself  to  the  tumultuous 
struggling  forces  in  her  psyche.  Quite  often  the  son-in-law  faces  the 
hostile,  sadistic  components  of  the  emotions  of  love  which  only  serve 
to  better  repress  the  prohibited  affectionate  feelings. 

The  relations  of  the  man  to  his  mother-in-law  are  complicated  by 
similar  feelings  which  flow,  however,  from  another  source.  As  a  rule 
the  road  of  object  selection  leading  to  the  love  object  is  followed  by 
the  man  over  the  images  of  his  mother  or  perhaps  his  sister.  The 
deflection  of  his  first  love  from  these  beloved  persons  of  his  childhood 
is  effected  by  the  incest  barriers  in  order  that  he  should  attain  in  a 
stranger  this  prototype.  In  place  of  his  mother  or  the  mother  of  his 
sister  he  is  now  confronted  by  the  mother-in-law.  This  gives  rise  to 
a  tendency  to  return  to  the  prehistoric  selection  which  is  rapidly 
repressed.  His  incest  shyness  demands  that  he  should  not  be 
reminded  of  the  geneology  of  his  love  selection.  The  rejection  is 
facilitated  by  the  actuality  of  the  mother-in-law  whom  he  did  not 
know  from  the  beginning  of  his  existence  and  hence,  unlike  his 
mother's,  her  image  does  not  remain  unchanged  in  his  unconscious. 
A  special  addition  of  attractiveness  and  repulsion  to  the  emotional 
mixture  allows  the  conjecture  that  the  mother-in-law  really  repre- 
sents an  incestuous  temptation  for  the  son-in-law.  On  the  other  hand, 
it  is  not  rare  for  a  man  to  fall  in  love  first  with  his  future  mother- 
in-law  before  turning  his  affection  to  her  daughter. 


'JsS  PSYCHANAIiTSIS 

With  the  brief  space  at  my  disposal  I  am  unable  to 
enter  into  any  psychological  explanation  of  these  different 
perversions  and  I  must  therefore  presuppose  a  knowledge 
of  the  Freudian  literature  on  the  part  of  my  readers.  I 
merely  repeal  that  parental  influences  play  a  great  part 
in  both  the  normal  and  neurotic  individual,  but  whereas 
the  normal  person  gets  away  at  least  consciously  from 
these  dominations  the  neurotic  remains  anchored  and 
succeeds  only  partially  in  freeing  himself  from  them. 
This  fixation  is  mainly  responsible  for  psychic  impotence, 
frigidity  and  homosexuality,12  and  its  general  influences 
can  always  be  found  in  every  psychoneurotic.13  I  know 
an  old  bachelor  of  forty-five  years,  an  only  son,  who  slept 
with  his  mother  until  she  died  four  years  ago.  He  is  a 
good  business  man  and  is  said  to  be  normal  in  every  other 
respect.  I  have  treated  an  old  maid,  a  favorite  daughter, 
who  lost  her  father  three  years  ago.  She  still  wears  black 
and  cries  bitterly  at  any  allusion  to  her  father.  She 
answered  as  follows  my  question  as  to  why  she  still  wore 
mourning:  "Why  shouldn't  I?  No  one  ever  had  such  a 
kind,  generous  and  self-sacrificing  father.  There  is  not 
another  man  like  him  in  this  world.  0!  how  I  love  this 
man,  etc."  This  may  sound  like  pure  filial  love,  but 
having  analyzed  her,  I  have  definitely  ascertained  that 
she  loved  her  father  as  any  woman  loves  a  stranger.  We 
can  readily  see  why  such  persons  cannot  marry.  This 
patient  characteristically  expressed  it  when  she  said: 
'  If  I  could  find  a  man  like  my  father  I  would  marry." 

Just  a  few  words  on  prophylaxis.  Of  course  it  would 
be  best  for  the  individual  as  well  as  the  race  that  there 
should  be  no  only  children.     However,  when   this  cannot 


THE    ONLY    OR   FAVORITE    CHILD    IN    ADULT    LIFE       289 

be  avoided  by  virtue  of  ill  health  or  death  of  one  of  the 
parents  the  child  need  not  necessarily  become  a  neurotic 
and  belong  to  any  of  the  categories  mentioned  above.  It 
all  depends  upon  its  subsequent  bringing  up. 

When  we  read  the  history  of  only  children  we  find  that 
only  those  who  have  been  brought  up  wrongly  develop  into 
abnormal  beings,  those  who  are  not  pampered  and  coddled 
have  the  same  chances  as  other  children.  As  classical 
examples  we  may  mention  Nero  and  Confucius,  the  former 
was  a  spoiled  only  child,  while  the  latter  was  a  well-bred 
only  child.  An  only  child  should  be  made  to  associate 
with  other  children  who  will  soon  teach  him  that  he  is  not 
the  only  one  in  the  world.  This  should  begin  at  a  very 
early  age.  I  have  seen  many  "nervous  and  wild"  only 
children  who  were  completely  changed  after  a  few  weeks' 
attendance  in  a  kindergarten  or  public  school.  But  what 
is  still  more  important  is  that  only  children  should  not  be 
gorged  with  parental  love.  Parents  should  take  care  that 
such  children  should  not  develop  an  exaggerated  idea  of 
their  own  personality  and  think  that  they  are  superior  to 
everybody.  For  individuals  imbued  with  such  paranoid 
ideas  are  bound  to  come  into  conflict  with  their  fellow- 
men.  What  is  true  of  the  individual  may  also  be  true 
of  a  race,  and  history  furnishes  us  with  a  very  nice 
example. 

I  refer  to  the  only  and  favorite  child  of  Jehovah,  the 
Jewish  race.  The  Bible  tells  us  that  the  Jews  are  the 
"chosen  people,"  "the  only  son,"  and  even  "the  first- 
born." That  the  Jews  have  displayed  all  the  attributes 
of  the  only  or  favorite  child  need  hardly  be  mentioned. 
From  the  Bible  we  learn  that  they  were  stiff-necked,  spoiled 

19 


200  PSTCHANALTSIS 

and  overbearing,  and  considered  themselves  superior 
to  every  oilier  nation.  Characteristics  of  such  nature 
have  been  attributed  to  them  by  almost  all  writers  of 
ancient  and  modern  times,  and  although  some  are  gross 
exaggerations  it  must  nevertheless  be  admitted  that  they 
are  essentially  correct  in  reference  to  the  Hebrews  of  an- 
tiquity and  the  modern  orthodox  European  Jews.  Still 
it  is  gral  ifying  to  note  that  this  no  longer  holds  true  of  the 
great  bulk  of  western  Jews  who  have  enjoyed  a  couple  of 
generations  of  freedom.  The  explanation  of  this  change 
is  given  by  Dr.  M.  Fishberg  14  in  his  very  interesting  book. 
He  plainly  shows  that  "Judaism  has  been  preserved 
throughout  the  long  years  of  Israel's  dispersion  by  two 
factors:  its  separative  ritualism,  which  prevented  close 
and  intimate  contact  with  non-Jews,  and  the  iron  laws  of 
Christian  theocracies  of  Europe  which  encouraged  and 
enforced  isolation."  In  other  words,  as  long  as  the  Jew 
has  been  imbued  with  the  racial  pride  of  belonging  to  the 
"chosen  people"  and  has  been  offering  daily  prayers  to 
Jehovah  because  he  was  not  created  a  gentile,  he  per- 
force remained  exclusive  and  therefore  was  suspected  and 
disliked  by  his  non- Jewish  neighbors.  When  we  study 
the  history  of  the  Jews  we  find  that  their  enforced  isolation 
was  the  result  of  an  early,  voluntary  clannish  exclusive- 
ness.  This  shows  the  striking  analogy  to  the  only  boy 
who  at  first  refuses  to  associate  with  others  because  he 
believes  himself  superior  to  everybody  else,  and  who  is 
later  excluded  from  social  relations  because  he  is  misunder- 
stood and  disliked.  Dr.  Fishberg  also  tells  us  that  as  soon 
as  the  barriers  are  removed  the  Jews  readily  assimilate 
and  all  former  prejudices  disappear.     The  only  boy,  too, 


THE    ONLY    OR    FAVORITE    CHILD    IN    ADULT    LIFE       291 

loses  his  identity  as  soon  as  lie  realizes  that  he  is  no  better 
than  his  fellow  beings. 

The  problem  is  more  complicated  when  we  come  to 
prophylaxis  in  relation  to  psychosexuality  and  I  regret 
that  I  am  unable  to  enter  here  into  a  long  discussion.  I 
shall  merely  say  that  parents  should  remember  that  proper 
sex  regulation  does  not  necessarily  imply  repression  and 
extermination  of  all  sex  feelings,  and  that  the  requisite 
for  perfect  manhood  and  womanhood  are  all  the  impulses 
and  desires  that  are  normally  common  to  men  and  women. 

In  conclusion  I  wish  to  say  that  the  only  child  is  a  mor- 
bid product  of  our  present  social  economic  system.  He 
is  usually  an  offspring  of  wealthy  parents  who,  having  been 
themselves  brought  up  in  luxury  and  anxious  that  their 
children  should  share  their  fate,  refuse  to  have  more  than 
one  or  two  children.  By  their  abnormal  love  they  not 
only  unfit  the  child  for  life's  battle  but  prevent  him  from 
developing  into  normal  manhood,  thus  producing  sexual 
perverts  and  neurotics  of  all  descriptions. 

References 

1.  Das  einzige  Kind.     Gmelin,  Miinchen. 

2.  A  paper  was  read  on  this  subject  by  Drs.  Sadger  and  Fried jung 
before  the  Vienna  Psychoanalytic  Society,  October  5,  1910. 

3.  Analyse  der  Phobie  eines  5  jahrigen  Knaben.  Jahrbuch  f. 
Psychoanalyse,  Vol.  I. 

4.  Experiences  Concerning  the  Psychic  Life  of  the  Child.  Trans- 
lated by  A.  A.  Brill,  Am.  Jour,  of  Psychology,  April,  1910. 

5.  Jung:  Symbole  und  Wandlungen  der  Libido.  Jahrbuch  f. 
Psychoanalyse,  Vol.  II. 

6.  Freud:  Zur  Dynamik  der  Uebertragung.  Zen tralblatt  f.  Psycho- 
analyse, II;  and  Brill:  A  Few  Remarks  on  the  Technique  of  Psych- 
analysis,  Medical  Review  of  Reviews,  April,  1912. 


292  PSY<  BANALYSIS 

7    Jung:  Die  Brdcutung  des  Vatcrs  fiir  das  Schicksal  des  Einzclnen. 
Jahrbuch  fiir  Psychoanalyse,  Vol.  I. 

8.  Throe    Contributions    to    the    Sexual    Theory.     Translated    by 
A.  A.  Brill. 

9.  Cf.  Chap.  VII. 

10.  Freud:  L.  c. 

11.  Abraham:  Die  Stellung  der  Verwandtenehe  in  der  Psychologie 
der  Neuroson.     Jahrbuch  fiir  Psychoanalyse,  Vol.  I. 

12.  Freud:  L.  c;  also  Ferenczi:  Analytische  Deutung  der  psycho- 
scxuellen  Impotenz  beim  Manne.  Psychiatr.  Neurolog.  Wochen- 
schrift,  1908,  and  the  works  of  Stekol,  Sadger  and  Steiner. 

13.  Freud:  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams,  p.  224. 

14.  The  Jews,  A  Study  of  Race  and  Environment.  Scribner's 
Pub.  Co. 


CHAPTER  XII 

FAIRY   TALES   AS   A   DETERMINANT   OF   DREAMS 
AND  NEUROTIC  SYMPTOMS.    THEIR  RELATION 
TO  ACTIVE  AND  PASSIVE  ALGOLAGNIA 

That  fairy  tales  should  play  a  part  in  the  determination 
of  dreams  and  neurotic  symptoms  is  not  at  all  surprising 
when  one  thinks  of  their  very  intimate  relation  to  child 
life.  It  is  well  known  that  from  the  very  dawn  of  civiliza- 
tion no  child  ever  grew  up  without  hearing  fairy  tales; 
they  are  found  universally  among  all  nations,  savage  or 
enlightened,  and  it  is,  therefore,  fair  to  assume  that  fairy 
tales  play  no  mean  part  in  the  moulding  of  the  young  mind. 

It  is  but  natural  that  those  who  recognize  the  importance 
of  early  impressions  as  an  influence  on  the  future  develop- 
ment of  morbid  states  should  be  more  interested  in  fairy 
tales  than  those  who  ignore  the  past  in  the  examination  and 
treatment  of  neurotic  symptoms.  Yet  it  is  a  strange  fact 
that  with  one  exception  no  psychanalyst  has  written  any- 
thing about  the  direct  influence  of  fairy  tales  on  dreams  and 
neurotic  symptoms.  To  be  sure,  much  has  been  published 
about  fairy  tales,  myths  and  folk-lore,1  showing  their  analogy 
to  dreams  and  to  the  symbolization  of  praecoxes,  but  it  was 
left  to  Prof.  Freud  to  report  some  dreams  in  which  fairy 
tales  played  a  direct  part.2  I  was  pleased,  but  not  sur- 
prised, to  read  this  interesting  contribution,  as  for  years 

I  have  been  gathering  material  showing  these  relations  not 

293 


294  PSYCHANALYSIS 

only  to  dreams,  but  to  neurotic  symptoms,  and  I  shall  here 
report  some  of  my  findings. 

An  unmarried  woman  of  twenty-nine  years  related  the 
following  dream: 

/  was  in  a  crowd,  and  when  I  got  away  I  was  followed  by  a 
very  hideous-looking  man.  I  ran  and  he  followed  me,  and 
finally  caught  me.  He  first  said  he  would  choke  me,  but  then 
decided  to  cut  my  head  off  with  a  big  carving  knife.  I  could 
see  the  blood  flowing  (terrible  fright). 

Analysis:  The  dreamer  is  somewhat  masochistic,  and 
like  most  unmarried  women  of  her  age  she  is  very  anxious 
to  get  a  husband.  The  evening  before  this  dream  she 
danced  with  a  man  concerning  whom  she  had  many  intimate 
fancies.  On  going  home  she  saw  a  disgusting-looking  drunk- 
ard. She  often  dreams  of  drunkards,  for  whom  she  enter- 
tains a  particular  repugnance.  Investigation  brought  out 
the  fact  that  years  before  a  man  made  love  to  her  while 
under  the  influence  of  liquor,  and,  owing  to  his  mental  state, 
he  was  quite  brutal  in  his  advances.  This  was  the  last  man 
who  made  love  to  her. 

The  cutting  off  of  her  head  recalled  Bluebeard,  who  was 
"frightful  looking  on  account  of  his  blue  beard."  This  story 
was  read  to  her  long  before  she  herself  could  read,  and  it 
produced  a  terrible  impression  on  her.  As  she  grew  older 
Bluebeard  was  the  subject  of  her  night-terrors,  and  at 
puberty  she  often  had  dreams  similar  to  the  one  just  de- 
scribed. The  dream  is  a  coitus  wish,  and  shows  the  mech- 
anism of  displacement  from  below  to  above.3 

Another  young  woman  of  twenty-seven  years  dreamed 
as  follows: 

/  was  with  C.  (a  little  niece)  in  the  menagerie,  and  all  the 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         295 

■wild  animals  came  out  of  the  cages  at  the  same  time.  I  was 
terribly  frightened,  as  I  felt  myself  responsible  for  C.'s  safety, 
and  I  knew  that  I  was  powerless  to  protect  her.  I  held  her 
tightly.  From  all  sides  came  lions,  tigers  and  bears.  I  saw  a 
stairway,  and  with  great  effort  we  worked  our  way  up  followed 
closely  by  the  animals.  After  a  long  time  I  reached  the  top 
of  the  flight  and  saw  several  doors.  All  were  closed,  and  on 
trying  each  in  succession  I  found  them  locked.  I  was  looking 
for  a  key  to  open  one  of  them,  but  was  still  searching  when  I 
awoke. 

Analysis:  This  patient  suffered  from  hysteria,  and  had 
a  terrible  disgust  for  sex.  She  had  had  many  opportunities 
to  marry,  but  whenever  she  thought  of  marital  relations  she 
rejected  all  her  suitors,  and  on  one  occasion  she  even  broke 
her  betrothal.  This  dream  occurred  after  most  of  her  sexual 
resistances  were  removed  by  psychanalysis.  The  free  as- 
sociations to  the  different  elements  of  the  dream  were  as 
follows:  Her  little  niece  typified  to  her  purity,  innocence, 
maidenhood,  qualities  which  she  attributed  to  herself,  and 
the  wild  animals  signified  the  animal  passions  that  were  pur- 
suing her.  Although  consciously  she  had  a  horror  for  sex, 
she  was  unconsciously  very  amorous  and  craved  it. 

The  great  effort  to  reach  the  top  of  the  stairs  signified  the 
mental  conflict  about  marriage,  and  getting  to  the  top  sig- 
nified the  acceptance  of  normal  sex  without  running  away 
from  it  as  she  was  wont  to  do  before.  The  whole  act  sym- 
bolizes coitus. 

The  several  closed  doors  which  she  could  not  open  signify 
the  many  opportunities  to  marry  which  she  let  slip.  Most 
of  the  men  who  pursued  her  were  no  longer  single.  The 
locked  doors  also   recalled   the  story  of  Bluebeard.     She 


290  PSYCHANALYSIS 

rejected  her  former  suitors  because  she  feared  sexual  inter- 
course, especially  the  act  of  defloration,  which  was  pictured 
to  her  as  "awfully  disgusting  and  very  painful."  Since  the 
age  of  puberty  she  identified  this  act  with  being  killed,  and 
thought  every  man  a  sort  of  Bluebeard. 

In  the  dream  she  was  looking  for  a  key  to  open  one  of  the 
doors.  At  this  part  of  the  dream  she  recalled  the  fairy  tale 
of  the  Enchanted  Princess,  which  runs  as  follows: 

A  poor  soldier  saved  an  enchanted  princess  by  stajing 
three  nights  in  her  castle,  where  a  wicked  magician  had 
changed  her  into  a  bear.  After  marrying  the  princess  and 
living  happily  for  some  time,  the  soldier  went  on  a  journey 
to  his  old  home.  During  his  absence  all  the  trees  dried 
and  faded.  He  met  with  many  adventures,  but  finally  the 
south  wind  carried  him  back  to  the  castle,  where  a  number 
of  kings  and  princes  were  gathered  to  woo  his  wife.  As 
soon  as  he  returned  the  trees  revived,  but  as  he  was  in- 
visible only  his  wife  knew  of  his  home-coming  by  this  sign. 
So  she  gave  her  guests  this  riddle  to  solve:  "I  had  a  wonderful 
hand-made  casket  icith  a  golden  hey  to  it.  I  lost  my  key  and 
never  expected  to  find  it,  but  suddenly  the  key  has  found  itself. 
Whoever  shall  guess  the  riddle  shall  be  my  husband." 

All  the  kings  and  princes  tried  in  vain  to  guess  it.  Then 
the  princess  said:  "Come  out  and  show  yourself,  my  be- 
loved!" The  soldier  took  off  the  cap  which  made  him  in- 
visible, and  taking  the  princess'  hand  he  kissed  her.  "Here 
is  the  key  to  my  riddle,"  said  the  princess.  "The  casket  is 
myself,  and  the  golden  key  is  my  husband."  All  the  wooers 
had  to  go  home,  and  the  princess  and  the  soldier  lived 
happily  ever  after.4 

This  fairy  tale  as  an  association  to  the  dream  is  of  double 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         297 

interest.  First,  it  explains  the  meaning  of  the  dream  by 
showing  the  patient  the  true  state  of  her  mind.  She  has 
overcome  most  of  her  sexual  resistances;  she  wishes  one  of 
her  suitors  would  come  back;  she  is  looking  for  the  key. 
Second,  it  also  shows  very  nicely  the  symbolization  of  the 
male  and  female  genitals  by  the  key  and  casket,  symbols 
that  are  often  encountered  in  dreams  and  myths. 

I  could  cite  any  number  of  dreams  showing  influences 
of  fairy  tales,  but  I  will  content  myself  with  these  two,  and 
will  proceed  to  show  the  part  played  by  fairy  tales  in  neurotic 
symptoms. 

Mr.  L.  is  a  young  man  of  about  thirty  years  who  suffered 
from  a  mixed  neurosis,  his  main  phobia  being  a  fear  of 
blood.  At  first  he  was  afraid  of  seeing  blood  because  it 
made  him  faint.  Later,  the  mere  idea  of  blood  produced 
the  same  effect.  He  was  afraid  to  talk  to  certain  people 
because  they  were  likely  to  speak  about  accidents  which 
would  suggest  blood.  The  sight  of  a  man  who  looked  like 
a  doctor  was  enough  to  evoke  the  idea  of  operation  and 
blood  with  the  accompanying  symptoms  of  anxiety.  By  a 
process  of  generalization  and  symbolization  the  idea  of 
blood  became  projected  to  almost  everything.  Thus, 
measuring  his  blood-pressure  brought  on  a  fainting  spell. 
It  is  not  my  intention  to  go  into  a  lengthy  analysis  of  the 
case.  I  merely  wish  to  show  some  of  the  determinants  of 
the  phobia. 

At  a  very  early  age  L.  displayed  a  striking  sexual  curiosity. 
At  the  age  of  seven  years  he  took  a  girl  to  a  water-closet  and 
practised  with  her  mutual  exhibitionism.  He  was  detected 
by  his  parents  and  severely  punished  for  it.  He  received 
much  information  about  sex  from  street  boys,  who  taught 


298  PSYCHANALYSIS 

him  to  repeat  many  vulgar  expressions.  At  the  same  age 
be  was  circumcised.  His  father  and  the  doctor  took  him 
off  the  street  one  afternoon  without  any  warning  and  put 
him  under  the  anesthetic.  When  he  regained  conscious- 
ness he  found  himself  bandaged  and  suffering  from  pain. 
At  still  an  earlier  age  he  was  instructed  by  one  of  his  asso- 
ciates that  the  vagina  was  like  a  piece  of  raw  beef  with  a 
cut  in  the  center.  Thereafter,  whenever  he  ate  steak  or  beef, 
he  thought  of  this  association.  During  the  analysis  I  found 
many  evidences  of  early  impressions  from  fairy  tales.  When 
he  was  quite  young  his  nurse  told  him  and  read  to  him  some 
of  the  most  gruesome  fairy  stories,  which  he  continued  to 
read  himself  at  a  later  age.  These  bloody  and  horrible 
stories  made  a  strong  impression  on  him.  He  would  form 
fancies  about  them  on  going  to  sleep  at  night,  substituting 
himself  for  the  hero.  He  continued  this  fancying  for  years, 
and  as  he  grew  older  they  were  usually  acompanied  by 
masturbation.  I  noticed  that  his  dreams  were  usually 
divided  into  three  parts,  and  investigation  showed  that  this 
was  due  to  the  fact  that  events  in  fairy  tales  usually  go  by 
threes.  The  prince  in  disguise  has  to  overcome  obstacles, 
and  always  succeeds  the  third  time.  When  he  became  old 
enough  to  say  his  prayers  before  going  to  sleep  he  divided 
them  also  into  three  parts,  each  expressing  a  distinct  w'ish. 
This  was  directly  determined  by  the  three  wishes  from  the 
fairy  tale.  His  dreams,  too,  usually  expressed  three  distinct 
wishes.  As  an  illustration  the  following  dream  will  serve: 
I  uns  looking  at  some  field-glasses,  and  there  roere  three  pair 
that  looked  exactly  alike,  but  they  had  different  prices.  Then 
I  was  in  a  room,  and  it  seemed  that  there  was  a  woman  there 
who  had  a  good  many  dogs  on  one  chain — all  on  the  same  chain — 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         299 

and  we  had  an  awful  time  trying  to  separate  them.  (Later 
addition:  They  all  wanted  to  bite  one  another's  tail.)  I  had 
sexual  intercourse  with  X.,  and  looked  into  her. 

The  following  are  some  of  the  associations  with  their 
analyses : 

The  field-glasses  symbolize  sexual  curiosity.  This  is  de- 
termined by  the  fact  that  at  the  age  of  eight  years  he  was 
often  very  anxious  to  get  his  father's  field-glasses,  and 
whenever  his  father  was  absent  he  went  through  his  private 
desk  and  got  them.  His  object  was  to  look  into  the  rooms 
across  the  way  in  the  hope  of  seeing  naked  women.  On 
one  occasion,  while  looking  through  the  desk,  he  found  a  col- 
lection of  pictures  representing  nude  females,  belonging 
to  his  father,  which  gave  him  considerable  food  for  sexual 
fancies.  The  three  field-glasses  symbolize  sexual  curiosity 
about  his  mother,  sister  and  wife.  When  a  boy  he  took 
every  occasion  to  see  his  mother  and  sister  naked,  and  since 
his  marriage  he  displays  the  same  morbid  cariosity  about 
his  wife.  He  likes  to  see  her  urinate  and  defecate,  and  often 
begs  for  this  privilege.  The  idea  behind  his  desire  always 
has  been:  "How  does  it  look  inside?"  He  often  looked 
through  the  keyhole  when  his  mother  or  sister  were  taking 
a  bath,  and  frequently  saw  them  naked.  This  association 
recalled  the  story  of  Bluebeard  in  which  curiosity  played 
a  great  part.  He  related  this  story  with  many  distortions. 
"Bluebeard  had  three  wives;  he  lived  in  a  castle  on  the  top 
of  which  no  one  was  permitted.  He  carried  a  large  key 
spotted  with  blood.  The  keyhole  was  also  bloody,"  etc. 
The  distortions  are  explained  as  follows:  The  three  wives 
are  his  mother,  sister  and  wife,  whom  he  often  identifies. 
In  this  connection  I  would  mention  a  strange  coincidence: 


300  PSYCHANALYSIS 

when  we  spoke  about  this  identification  he  told  me  that 
his  wife  and  sister  remarkably  resembled  each  other;  they 
look  like  twin  sisters,  and  are  repeatedly  mistaken  for  each 
other.  I  will  add  that  they  are  not  at  all  related.  He  was 
born  on  the  Pacific  coast,  while  his  wife  is  a  New  England 
girl.  The  resemblance  is  so  marked  that  even  his  own  and 
his  wife's  relatives  and  his  sister's  schoolmates  often  mis- 
take his  wife  for  his  sister.  I  have  in  my  possession  photo- 
graphs of  both.  I  have  shown  them  to  many  people,  but 
none  could  positively  distinguish  one  from  the  other.  His 
sister  is  the  image  of  his  mother. 

The  bloody  key  recalled  another  dream  in  which  the  key 
wras  a  symbol  for  the  penis.  This  symbol  did  not  have  to 
be  explained  to  him.  He  attended  a  boys'  school  where  the 
boys  used  to  refer  to  the  penis  as  "nookie."  This  neologism 
stood  for  "new  key,"  and  was  well  known  to  all  the  boys. 
The  bloody  key  and  keyhole  correspond  to  his  early  con- 
ception of  the  female  genitals  as  a  piece  of  raw  beef  with  a 
cut  in  the  center,  as  well  as  to  his  circumcision. 

Besides  the  story  of  Bluebeard,  he  used  to  build  many 
fancies  on  the  story  of  the  princess  who  was  rolled  in  a 
barrel  into  which  long  pointed  spikes  were  driven,  and  as  he 
grew  older  he  was  fascinated  by  the  Iron  Maiden,  which  he 
saw  in  a  museum  and  concerning  which  he  wove  many  fan- 
cies. In  other  words,  his  sadistic  component  was  markedly 
accentuated  and  kept  alive  by  these  blood-curdling  fairy 
stories,  which  later  formed  the  direct  connection  between 
blood,  cruelty  and  sex.  There  were  other  determinants — 
thus  the  identification  with  his  mother  who  was  also  afraid 
of  blood — but  I  cannot  take  them  up  here. 

The  other  part  of  the  dream — the  dogs  holding  each  other 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         301 

by  the  tail — refers  to  fellatio,  which  he  practiced  as  a  boy, 
and  to  some  homosexual  experiences  in  later  life. 

Doing  things  three  times  and  succeeding  only  in  the  end, 
as  is  so  often  found  in  the  different  collections  of  fairy  tales, 
has  given  rise  to  many  superstitions.  A  nice  example  was 
furnished  me  by  the  analysis  of  this  dream:  "I  saw  three 
long-necked  bottles.  One  was  almost  broken  to  pieces,  the 
second  was  cracked  and  the  third  contained  sparkling  cham- 
pagne." 

This  dream  was  given  to  me  by  a  widow  of  forty-two  years. 
As  far  back  as  she  remembered  all  her  important  affairs  of 
life  went  by  threes.  Before  her  marriage  she  measured  her 
suitors  in  this  way.  She  never  expected  much  of  the  first 
suitor,  she  looked  with  greater  favor  on  the  second  and 
expected  to  marry  the  third.  The  man  whom  she  actually 
married  had  to  propose  to  her  three  times  before  she  ac- 
cepted him.  This  number-three  ceremonial  was  determined 
by  the  fairy  stories  she  used  to  hear  and  read  since  childhood, 
especially  the  following  one,  which  she  consciously  took  as  a 
model.  It  is  the  story  of  a  princess  whom  her  father  put  in 
a  castle  on  the  top  of  a  very  steep  glass  mountain.  The 
knight  who  could  get  up  there  on  his  horse  was  to  receive 
her  in  marriage.  The  youngest  of  three  brothers,  who 
was  considered  a  simpleton,  but  who  was  really  the  smartest 
of  all  of  them,  finally  reached  the  top  on  the  third  attempt, 
and  married  the  princess. 

This  number-three  ceremonial  was  really  one  of  her  ob- 
sessions. For  years  it  was  subjected  to  all  kinds  of  modi- 
fications, thus,  if  she  accidentally  broke  a  dish,  she  had  no 
rest  until  she  broke  two  more  dishes,  so  that  she  always  had 
on  hand  some  discarded  bottles  which  served  that  purpose. 


302  PSYCHANALYSIS 

Whenever  she  broke  something  by  accident  she  immediately 
broke  two  more  bottles.  We  can  now  understand  her 
dream.  The  three  long-necked  bottles  are  symbolic  of  three 
men.  Her  dead  husband  is  represented  by  the  broken 
bottle,  the  man  who  was  her  lover  for  years  after  her  hus- 
band's death  is  represented  by  the  cracked  bottle,  while  the 
third  one  containing  sparkling  champagne  is  meant  to 
represent  the  man  who  was  paying  her  attention  at  the  time 
of  the  dream.  The  champagne  in  the  bottle  is  doubly  de- 
termined; it  symbolizes  the  quality  of  the  man,  and  is  an 
allusion  to  alcoholism  to  which  they  were  both  addicted. 

With  one  exception,  all  the  cases  showing  the  influence  of 
fairy  tales  that  came  under  my  notice  were  usually  neuroses 
or  negatives  of  perversions.  The  following  case  is  of  in- 
terest, because  here  the  fairy  tales  and  mythological  stories 
directly  determine  the  perversion  of  sadism. 

This  patient,  a  young  man  of  twenty-eight  years,  was 
homosexual,  and  had  morbid  desires  to  bite  and  stab  people, 
and  to  torture  them  in  all  sorts  of  fiendish  ways.  He 
stated  that  when  he  felt  weak  he  indulged  in  horrid,  sadistic 
fancies,  which  gave  him  strength  and  vigor.  He  yearned 
for  those  times  when  everybody  carried  the  dirk  and  dagger, 
and  could  kill  when  offended.  He  often  carried  a  revolver, 
although  he  never  used  it.  He  was  fascinated  by  wild  ani- 
mals, especially  the  tiger,  which  always  excited  him.  He 
spent  much  time  in  the  menagerie  in  front  of  the  tiger's 
cage,  and  when  unobserved  by  the  keeper  he  would  tease  the 
animal  in  order  to  see  him  jump  and  hear  him  roar.  He 
was  under  the  impression  that  he  exerted  a  similar  in- 
fluence on  the  tiger,  and  on  other  wild  animals.  It  seemed 
to  him  that  the  tiger  became  restless  in  his  presence  and 


•     FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         303 

grew  more  ferocious  when  he  looked  at  him.  A  fancy  which 
often  recurred  was  the  following:  "I  am  annoyed  and 
angered  by  some  one  to  such  an  extent  that  I  run  wild  and 
bite  everybody  that  comes  in  my  way,  until  I  bite  my  way 
into  some  person's  body." 

Concerning  the  life  of  this  patient,  whom  we  shall  desig- 
nate as  L.,  it  may  be  said  that  he  is  somewhat  burdened  by 
heredity,  that  he  is  of  American  parentage  and  was  brought 
up  in  cultured  surroundings.  He  always  wished  to  be  an 
actor,  and  for  at  least  two  seasons  he  was  a  member  of  a 
stock  company.  Being  a  delicate  child,  his  mother  was 
particularly  anxious  about  him  and  gave  him  more  care 
and  love  than  to  the  other  children.  Thus  he  recalled  that 
he  often  slept  with  his  mother  up  to  the  age  of  eight,  and 
also  at  a  later  age  whenever  he  was  not  feeling  well.  He 
was  very  precocious  and  inquisitive,  and  displayed  sexual 
curiosity  at  a  very  early  age.  At  the  age  of  six  years  he 
actually  forced  his  mother  to  tell  him  some  of  the  true  facts 
of  childbirth.  He  remembers  distinctly  that  he  experienced 
sexual  feelings  between  the  ages  of  four  and  five  years. 
These  feelings  were  of  a  polymorphous  perverse  nature,  and 
at  first  mainly  concerned  sexual  looking  and  exhibitionism. 
Even  at  that  age  he  was  morbidly  attracted  by  the  male 
and  female  naked  bodies,  especially  by  the  genitals.  The 
objects  of  his  curiosity  were  the  persons  of  his  immediate 
surroundings.  At  the  age  of  six  years  he  once  caused  his 
little  sister  to  perform  fellatio  on  him.  He  began  to  mas- 
turbate at  the  age  of  seven  years,  and  continued  on  and  off 
for  some  time.  At  the  age  of  twelve  years  he  began  to 
suffer  from  the  mental  conflicts  which  usually  accompany 
masturbation,  and  which,  finally,  caused  him  to  give  it  up. 


304  PSYCHANALYSIS 

He  never  had  any  heterosexual  feelings,  and  since  the  age 
of  four  years  he  began  to  manifest  homosexual  tendencies 
which  gradually  developed  into  true  homosexuality.5 

Very  soon  after  entering  into  this  patient's  psychic  de- 
velopment I  noticed  that  his  symptoms  were  largely  de- 
termined by  fairy  stories,  fables  and  myths.  Thus,  his 
sadism  and  other  symptoms  unmistakably  showed  an 
archaic  setting.  The  associations  to  almost  all  his  dreams 
showed  how  all  his  inner  environments  corresponded  more 
to  a  world,  as  described  by  Anderson,  Grimm,  Lang  and 
others,  than  to  our  present  times.  The  following  dream 
fragment  with  its  associations  will  show  this: 

On  Fifth  Avenue,  with  a  crowd  of  people  looking  at  a  tiger. 
Whenever  the  animal  comes  my  way  I  fly  up  to  the  roof  of  a 
neighboring  house. 

Associations:  Flying  recalled  that  as  a  child  he  often 
entertained  many  wishes  to  be  able  to  fly  above  the  clouds, 
among  the  stars  and  planets.  This  recalled  his  insatiable 
interest  in  astronomy  at  the  age  of  seven  to  eight  years. 
He  used  to  ask  everybody  about  the  stars.  He  thought  that 
the  dog  star  was  a  real  dog.  He  was  told  about  the  milky 
way,  and  thought  of  it  in  terms  of  real  milk.  At  about 
the  same  period,  or  even  earlier,  he  was  keenly  interested 
in  trees.  He  wanted  to  know  where  the  sap  came  from,  and 
very  often  dug  into  the  ground  in  order  to  discover  it.  The 
associations  then  took  him  back  to  a  still  earlier  period  of  his 
life,  when  the  interest  was  centered  on  the  bodily  functions 
and  on  childbirth.  After  having  been  told  that  children 
grow  in  the  mother  he  decided  that  they  must  come  out  like 
a  passage  of  the  bowels.  This  caused  him  to  take  a  special 
interest  in  the  openings  of  the  body,6  such  as  the  mouth, 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         305 

nose  and  anus,  as  well  as  in  their  gaseous  emanations,  such 
as  air  and  flatus.  The  interest  for  mysterious  openings 
was  later  projected  to  the  outer  world,  so  that  he  was  very 
interested  in  and  attracted  to  caves.  While  in  Sorrento  he 
made  many  expeditions  to  a  subterranean  passage  some  dis- 
tance from  the  temple  of  Hercules,  which  he  realized  was 
only  a  continuation  of  his  childish  interest  for  dark  openings. 
For  the  same  reason,  he  was  also  fascinated  by  the  human 
voice.  This  was  at  the  age  of  sixteen  to  seventeen  years, 
and  one  of  his  few  heterosexual  erotic  dreams  at  that  age 
was  a  stereotyped  dream  of  hugging  a  woman  because  she 
had  a  beautiful  voice.  He  wondered  what  took  place  in 
those  dark  places  "way  down  in  the  mouth  and  way  up 
in  the  anus."  He  was  curious  to  find  out  how  the  child 
lives  in  the  mother's  bowels,  how  it  came  out,  and  wished  to 
go  up  there  to  find  out  all  these  mysteries.  This  fancy 
was  facilitated  by  many  fairy  stories,  especially  the  ones 
concerning  the  twelve  princes,  who  were  called  One,  Two, 
Three,  Four,  etc.,  to  Twelve,  who  went  down  to  the  bowels 
of  the  earth  and  then  became  rabbits  and  burrowed  their 
way  up,  and  the  princes  who  ran  away  into  the  bowels  of 
the  earth  and  met  with  many  strange  adventures  in  goblin 
land.  He  gave  much  thought  to  food  taken  into  the  body. 
He  was  curious  to  know  how  it  disappeared  and  what  be- 
came of  it.  The  same  interest  was  shown  for  the  excrements, 
thus,  he  would  urinate  on  the  ground  and  then  wonder  what 
happened  to  the  urine.  As  almost  all  his  fancies  were  cen- 
tered around  his  mother,  the  connection  was  soon  formed 
between  her  bowels  and  the  bowels  of  the  earth.  Indeed, 
all  his  inquisitiveness  concerning  the  earth,  trees,  plants, 

sap    nourishment    and    excretions    simply    expressed    his 
20 


306  PSYCHANALYSIS 

struggles  with  the  problem  <>f  childbirth  and  life.  He  was 
very  imaginative,  so  that  the  harrowing  adventures  enacted 
by  fairies,  genii  and  Greek  deities  on  which  he  was  con- 
stantly fed  were  deeply  interwoven  with  his  own  life,  and  he 
thus  built  up  for  himself  a  strange  archaic  world.  He  liked 
to  be  alone,  and  often  wandered  away  from  his  companions 
to  act  through  in  his  own  way  the  adventures  and  prayers 
which  he  had  just  heard  or  read.  He  himself  traced  the 
selection  of  his  profession,  that  of  an  actor,  to  these  boyish 
actions  when  he  tried  to  imitate  the  fleet-footed  Mercury, 
some  character  from  fairy  land,  the  Arabian  Nights  or 
some  savage  Indians.  He  thus  imagined  himself  flying  and 
beheading  monsters  above  the  clouds,  or  penetrating  to  the 
center  of  the  earth  in  the  form  of  some  wicked  magician,  all 
the  time  passing  through  the  most  harrowing  scenes.  By 
a  process  of  condensation  he  fused  ancient  characters  and 
episodes  with  persons  and  actions  of  reality,  but  all  his 
fancies  usually  began  with  some  god  or  demon-like  myth 
and  gradually  descended  to  human  beings.  During  the 
first  few  weeks  of  the  analysis  he  was  in  the  habit  of  merg- 
ing into  a  dreamy  state  while  reproducing  associations,  and 
often  became  so  excited  that  the  work  had  to  be  tempo- 
rarily interrupted.  Thus,  the  associations  reproduced  to 
tiger  mentioned  in  his  dream  were  as  follows:  "A  tiger 
always  excites  me;  I  feel  akin  to  the  tiger;  some  people  effect 
me  in  the  same  way.  My  father  used  to  have  something 
of  it.  My  aunt  X.,  who  was  once  crazy,  had  something  of 
the  tiger  in  her.  She  had  a  very  strong  personality,  and 
was  very  passionate.  At  the  age  of  fifty  years  she  married 
a  young  man  of  twenty  years.  Mrs.  C.  (a  paranoid,  elderly 
person,  with  whom  he  lived  for  about  a  year)  had  much  of 


FAIRY    TALES   AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         307 

the  tiger  in  her,  that  is  why  she  attracted  me  so  much; 
but  W.  (a  prominent  actress)  has  more  of  the  tiger  in  her 
than  any  one  else."  He  then  went  on  to  say  that  some  one 
told  him  that  the  human  fetus  passes  through  many  animal 
stages  before  birth;  that  it  is  at  first  a  dog  or  a  cat,  and 
then  develops  into  a  higher  animal  until  it  becomes  human. 
He  thought  that  animals  represented  only  arrested  de- 
velopments of  men,  and  that  he  himself  reached  to  the 
stage  of  the  tiger.  This  accounted  for  his  kinship  with 
this  beast.  The  tiger  also  recalled  blood  and  animal  feel- 
ing. "The  tiger  gives  me  a  strange  feeling  all  over  the 
body,  especially  in  the  genitals.  When  I  think  about  him 
I  feel  irritable  like  a  caged  animal.  It  recalls  my  aggressive 
feeling — I  feel  restless.  I  see  the  claws,  blood-rending 
fierceness;  its  horrible  (marked  excitement).  I  think  of 
flying;  I  see  huge  space  and  stars — they  exist  and  we  cannot 
grasp  them.  I  feel  like  rushing  up  and  beating  my  head 
against  the  wall.  I  feel  like  destroying  everything.  I 
think  of  the  tiger's  hot  breath  which  I'd  like  to  inhale.  I 
have  a  peculiar  feeling  down  inside  like  hot  blood  surging  in 
me.  I  feel  like  a  child.  I  would  like  to  touch  the  stars. 
I  have  a  feeling  of  licking  something.  I  would  like  to  go 
way  up  inside  of  it,  or  way  down  into  the  bowels  of  the 
earth  to  the  vegetation  and  seed  to  see  where  life  comes 
from  (early  conception  of  childbirth).  A  tiger  comes  from 
another  tiger"  (referring  to  his  own  birth).  He  then  pro- 
ceeded to  reproduce  scenes  from  his  childhood,  when  he 
played  in  the  garden  where  the  trees  were  the  object  of  many 
fantastic  speculations.  The  trees  suggested  to  him  life,  and 
the  sap  represented  vital  fluid.  He  thought  of  trees  as  living 
beings  {Confer  the  talking  trees  in  Greek  mythology  and 


308  PSYCHANALYSIS 

iEsops  Fables).  As  a  boy,  they  fascinated  him  and  often 
excited  him  to  an  extent  that  he  desired  coitus.  This  de- 
sire came  when  he  felt  weak  and  depressed,  and  he  imagined 
that  coitus  with  trees  would  give  him  renewed  vigor.  When 
told  to  go  on  with  the  associations  he  thought  of  a  graveyard 
which  was  near  the  garden.  To  quote  further:  "I  thought 
of  the  children  who  were  buried  there.  I  can  see  white  bodies, 
and  hear  the  tolling  of  church-bells.  I  am  a  corpse,  very 
cold,  awfully  cold.  I  feel  the  moisture  coming  through  the 
earth  and  wetting  everything.  Its  dreadfully  cold  and 
dreary.  I  see  blood  in  the  white  snow,  as  if  some  one  was 
killed  (excitement  and  trembling).  I  don't  wish  to  think  of 
it,  its  horrible;  that  licking  sensation  comes  over  me,  I  feel 
like  licking  blood.  I  feel  like  killing  myself;  I  feel  like 
destroying  everything"  (stopped  for  a  wrhile  and  then 
continued).  "I  see  a  beautiful  woman  with  a  skull  in  her 
hands.  I  love  her  very  much.  She  seems  to  be  devoted 
to  the  skull.  She  is  under  ground  as  if  after  death;  I  hear 
the  wind  blowing  dead,  dry  leaves;  spirits  seem  to  be  around. 
We  are  in  the  bowels  of  the  earth  wrhere  there  is  the  setting 
sun  and  stars.  I  see  a  stream  of  very  clear  water,  and  she 
wants  to  bathe  in  it;  I  want  to  do  the  same.  She  is  dressed 
in  white;  she  is  very  pale  with  long  hair  hanging  down  her 
back.     She  now  resembles  my  mother  and  sister,"  etc. 

This  is  a  fair  example  of  his  reproductions.  While  recit- 
ing these  and  similar  uncanny  associations  he  usually  be- 
came very  nervous  and  excited,  so  that  it  frequently  became 
necessary  to  arouse  him  from  his  dreamy  state  for  fear  that 
he  would  do  some  harm.  When  I  went  still  further  into 
the  different  components  of  these  associations,  I  found  that 
they  were  all  explained  by  some  fairy  tale  or  myth.    Thus, 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         309 

the  flying  was  not  only  determined  by  flying  fairies,  but 
recalled  also  the  story  of  Perseus,  who  undertook  an  expedi- 
tion against  the  Islands  of  the  Gorgons,  for  which  purpose 
he  was  furnished  by  Vulcan  with  a  sickle-shaped  sword, 
by  Mercury  with  winged  shoes,  etc.  He  vividly  recalled 
the  many  adventures  Perseus  encountered,  how  he  rode  the 
flying  horse  Pegasus,  and  how  he  finally  cut  off  Medusa's 
head,  and  so  on.  The  subject  of  flying  always  had  a  morbid 
interest  for  him.  He  often  had  dreams  and  fancies  of  fly- 
ing above  tall  trees  and  tropical  vegetations.  As  far  as  I 
could  investigate  they  were  based  on  the  infantile  "Allmacht 
des  Gedankens,"  when  he  wished  to  be  big  and  imitate  the 
heroes  of  his  imaginary  world.  Later  in  life  he  noticed  that 
the  flying  dreams  and  fancies  usually  occurred  whenever 

he  was  very  depressed.  They  thus  served  as  a  compensa- 
tion for  his  sorrows  or  as  a  refuge  from  reality;  also,  flying 
above  the  clouds  and  high  trees  is  the  opposite  of  going 
down  to  the  bowels  of  the  earth.  The  latter  were  identified 
with  his  mother's  bowels,  i.  e.,  the  interior  of  his  mother. 
At  the  age  of  six  and  seven  years,  and  perhaps  even  earlier, 
he  often  yearned  to  be  back  in  his  mother's  bowels.  This  is 
confirmed  by  the  contiguous  association  concerning  the 
children  buried  in  the  graveyard  and  himself  being  a  corpse. 
The  earth  was  symbolic  of  his  own  mother  or  mother  earth, 
while  the  tall  trees  producing  sap  symbolized  his  father. 

The  strangest  of  all  his  impulses  was  sexual  union  with  the 
earth.     He  often  put  this  morbid  desire  into  practice,  and 

maintained  that  it  strengthened  and  invigorated  him.    The 

moisture,  snow,  cold,  dreariness,  etc.,  brought  back  many 

such  scenes  from  fairy  tales  and  mythology.    It  also  recalled 

Eva,  the  heroine  in  the  Little  People  of  the  Snow,  by  William 


310  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

CuIKmi  Bryant,  who  was  enticed  by  the  snow  fairy  and  taken 
to  a  snow  cave,  where  she  went  through  many  adventures 
and  was  finally  found  by  her  parents  frozen  to  death. 

The  next  associations  concerned  the  beautiful  woman 
who  held  a  skull,  to  which  she  was  devoted  and  whom  he 
loved  so  much.  The  woman  represents  a  condensation  of 
his  mother  and  his  sister,  as  shown  by  the  woman's  resem- 
blance to  them.  The  sister  referred  to  was  his  senior  by  a 
little  over  a  year.  As  children  they  were  very  intimate  and 
always  played  together.  He  recalled  particularly  one  game 
which  he  himself  invented,  It  was  called  "knockers,"  and 
meant  that  everybody  would  be  knocked  on  the  head  and 
killed, — parents,  sisters,  brothers  and  everybody  else. 
They  would  then  fancy  how  they  would  be  the  only  ones 
left  in  this  world,  how7  they  would  marry  and  have  children 
together  and  have  so  much  fun. 

The  skull  represented  himself  and  his  dead  father,  to 
both  of  whom  his  mother  and  this  particular  sister  were 
very  devoted. 

As  we  have  to  content  ourselves  with  a  small  fragment 
of  this  strange  case,  we  shall  proceed  to  the  following  sum- 
mary: We  have  here  a  psychopathic  individual  of  twenty- 
eight  years,  somewhat  burdened  by  heredity,  who  was 
homosexual  and  evinced  many  perversions.  His  sexual 
life  wras  infantile  in  its  make-up,  evincing  polymorphous 
perversities.  When  we  traced  its  development  we  found 
that  it  did  not  follow  the  normal  stages.  The  inversion 
began  to  manifest  itself  between  four  and  five  years,  and 
the  sadism  at  about  the  same  age.  These  abnormal  feel- 
ings continued  more  or  less  to  the  age  of  puberty.  He  dis- 
played a  strong  homosexual  curiosity  throughout  his  whole 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         311 

life,  and  sadism  cropped  up  every  once  in  a  while  in  his 
effort  at  adjustment.  Thus,  at  the  age  of  four  to  five  years 
he  evinced  homosexual  feelings  for  his  father,  and  at  six 
years  he  was  passionately  fond  of  a  doll,  a  dark-haired  boy; 
he  invented  sadistic  games,  knocked  down  and  trampled 
on  little  girls  while  playing  with  them;  and,  at  the  age  of 
thirteen  years,  while  attending  his  aunt's  funeral,  he  was 
severely  reprimanded  because  he  simply  could  not  stop 
laughing.  At  the  age  of  puberty  and  later  his  abnormal 
feelings  gradually  assumed  much  greater  proportions. 
He  was  constantly  obsessed  with  homosexual  feelings,  had 
many  homosexual  affairs,  and,  although  he  never  indulged 
in  gross  homosexual  practices,  he  was  continually  forced  to 
suppress  strong  desires  for  fellatio.  As  far  as  I  could  dis- 
cover, it  was  his  religious  and  ethical  training  (fear  of  the 
law)  that  restrained  him  from  putting  his  homosexual 
desires  in  operation;  for  the  same  reason  he  held  in  check 
his  sadism,  his  masturbation  and  the  other  partial  impulses. 
Whenever  he  indulged  in  masturbation  or  in  sexual  looking, 
he  became  very  remorseful  and  passed  through  many  reli- 
gious conflicts.  As  he  grew  older  there  was  a  regressive 
revival,  or  perhaps  only  an  increase  in  his  libido,  and  he 
then  resorted  entirely  to  fancy  formations  of  a  sadistic 
homosexual  nature.  These  fancies  were  a  substitute  for 
reality,  and,  as  was  shown  above,  served  in  a  manner  to 
gratify  his  abnormal  sexuality. 

But  besides  these  fancies  he  sometimes  indulged  in  very 
strange  ceremonials.  I  refer  to  his  sexual  impulses  for  trees 
and  the  earth.  From  what  was  said  above  and  other  material 
not  reported  here,  it  is  quite  clear  that  we  deal  with  erotic 
symbolisms  which  sprang  into  existence  by  way  of  "ani- 


312  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

mism,"  that  is,  like  primitive  man,  he  assumed  personality 
in  objects.  He  considered  the  earth  and  trees  in  the  light 
of  human  beings.  This  is  nothing  but  a  form  of  archaic 
thinking,  found  in  the  earliest  stages  of  mental  evolution 
among  savages  {Confer  the  many  myths,  especially  those  of 
the  American  Indian)  and  in  our  times  among  children  and 
psychotics.*  Here  the  tree  symbolizes  his  father,  while 
the  earth,  his  mother,  symbols  which  may  sound  strange 
only  to  the  modern  mind.  In  antiquity  those  very  symbols 
are  ubiquitous.  The  earth  or  mother  earth  and  the  trees 
are  early  symbols  of  the  female  and  the  male  principles 
found  in  the  mythology  of  all  races,7  thus  the  Latins 
referred  to  the  penis  as  arbor  (tree).8f 

That  the  patient  should  have  adopted  these  symbols  of 
antiquity  will  not  be  surprising  to  those  who  are  acquainted 
with  psychanalysis,  and  who  followed  the  various  stages 
that  lead  to  this  adoption.  Moreover,  this  becomes  clearer 
if  we  recall  the  psychological  mechanisms  of  homosexuality,! 

*  Even  at  a  much  later  stage  of  civilization  we  find  that  Xerxes 
ordered  the  sea  scourged  because  his  bridges  across  the  Hellespont 
had  been  wrecked  by  a  violent  storm.  Recently,  I  had  been  present 
when  a  child  could  not  be  appeased  until  a  chair  against  which  it  fell 
was  spanked.  Cf.  also  Freud's  Totem  and  Taboo,  Heller  &  Co., 
Wien;  and  Jung:  Wandlungen  und  Symbole  der  Libido,  Jahrbuch  f. 
Psychoanalyse  u.  Psychopathologie,  Vols.  Ill  and  IV.  Cf.  also  the 
works  of  Nelken  and  Spielrein. 

1 1  am  indebted  to  Dr.  Reginald  Alfred  Allan  for  calling  my  attention 
to  the  poem  L'arbre  in  Les  Chansons  de  Bilitis,  which  contains  a  de- 
scription of  sexual  congress  with  a  tree. 

%  For  the  benefit  of  those  who  have  not  followed  the  literature  I  shall 
cite  this  abstract  from  my  paper,  "The  Conception  of  Homosexuality," 
Jour.  Amer.  Med.  Assoc,  Aug.  2,  1913: 

"Those  who  are  acquainted  with  the  principles  of  psychanalysis 
will  recall  the   close   connection   between   neuroses   and   perversions. 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         313 

all  of  which  were  found  in  our  patient.  Thus,  although  he 
evinced  homosexual  desires  at  an  early  age  he  was  not  at  all 

Every  neurosis  regularly  shows  some  admixture  of  inversion,  and 
during  the  analysis  of  a  hysteria  or  compulsion  neurosis  one  invariably 
finds  some  homosexual  roots.  When  we  analyze  a  case  of  inversion  we 
find  that  the  masculine  ideals  of  the  invert  regularly  conceal  the  early 
infantile  feminine  ideals,  usually  the  mother  or  foster-mother,  which 
succumb  to  repression  at  a  very  early  age.  Before  the  age  of  puberty 
the  sexual  feelings  are  usually  unspecialized,  and  the  persistent  desire 
for  the  man  usually  makes  its  appearance  at  or  shortly  before  puberty. 
The  lasting  homosexual  desire  is  usually  brought  about  by  the  fact 
that  the  mother  loses  her  role  as  an  ideal  forever,  or  for  a  long  time,  either 
through  death,  illness,  or  other  estrangement.  The  later  homosexual 
may  then  turn  to  his  father,  older  brother  or  some  older  man  of  his 
environment.  Among  the  homosexual  ideals,  and  besides  the  homo- 
sexual and  heterosexual  features  hitherto  desired,  one's  own  person 
(one's  own  image)  plays  a  great  part;  in  other  words,  the  road  to  homo- 
sexuality always  passes  over  narcissism,  that  is,  love  for  one's  self. 
The  stage  of  narcissism  is  characterized  by  the  fact  that  the  developing 
individual,  while  collecting  into  a  unit  his  active  auto-erotic  sexual 
impulses  in  order  to  gain  the  love  object,  takes  first  himself,  his  own 
body,  as  the  object,  before  going  over  to  the  object  selection  of  a  strange 
person.  Narcissism  is,  therefore,  a  necessary  stage  of  development  in 
the  transition  from  auto-erotism  to  the  later  love  object.  The  love 
for  one's  own  person,  which  only  conceals  the  love  for  one's  own  gen- 
itals, represents  a  stage  of  development  which  is  always  present  and  in 
a  great  many  persons  lasts  a  long  time.  The  remaining  road  later  leads 
to  the  choice  of  objects  with  similar  genitals.  As  Sadger  puts  it: 
Every  man  usually  has  two  primary  and  primitive  sexual  objects, 
and  his  future  life  depends  on  whether  or  not  he  finally  remains  fixed, 
and  on  which  of  the  two  the  fixation  takes  place.  For  the  man  these 
two  objects  are  his  mother  or  foster-mother  and  his  own  person.  To 
remain  healthy  he  must  rid  himself  of  both,  and  not  tarry  too  long  with 
either  of  them.  It  is  assumed  that  the  invert  could  not  get  away  from 
himself,  that  is,  he  was  unable  to  free  himself  from  the  desire  of  requir- 
ing genitals  similar  to  his  own  in  the  love  object.  He  is  more  suc- 
cessful, however,  in  freeing  himself  from  his  mother-image,  which  is 


314  PSYCHANALYSIS 

indifferent  to  the  charms  of  women.  At  the  age  of  fourteen 
he  entertained  an  ideal  love  for  a  girl  older  than  himself. 
On  one  occasion  he  was  in  love  with  a  well-known  actress, 
and  had  besides  many  adventurous  experiences  with  other 
women.  It  must,  however,  be  remarked  that  none  at- 
tracted him  sexually.  He  was  always  very  much  attached 
to  his  mother,  and  as  a  child  he  was  extremely  jealous  of 
his  father,  so  that  he  could  not  tolerate  any  affection  shown 
by  his  mother.  Here,  too,  his  sadism  often  became  mani- 
fest— he  tyrannized  over  his  mother  and  had  sadistic  dreams 
in  which  she  was  maltreated.  One  dream,  which  left  a 
strong  impression  on  him,  was  the  following: 

"A  masculine  woman,  with  yellow  hair  and  black  dress,  visited 
my  mother  in  our  summer  home.  She  got  my  mother  on  the 
table  and  nearly  beat  the  life  out  of  her.  She  caught  hold  of 
my  mother's  hair  and  it  came  off  as  though  it  were  artificial. 


brought  about  by  identifying  himself  with  her,  and  thus  taking  him- 
self as  the  sexual  object.  With  the  repression  of  the  love  for  the 
mother  there  occurs  a  repression  of  love  for  all  womankind.  Accord- 
ing to  Sadger  it  follows  the  following  trend  of  thought:  "If  the  best 
of  all  women,  my  own  mother,  amounts  to  so  little,  how  could  any 
other  woman  stand  the  test?"  As  soon  as  the  analysis  is  entered  on, 
one  often  finds  that  the  inverts  are  not  at  all  indifferent  to  the  charms 
of  women,  but  as  soon  as  any  excitation  is  evoked  by  the  woman  it  is 
at  once  transferred  to  a  male  object.  This  mechanism,  which  gave 
origin  to  the  inversion,  is  thus  repeated  throughout  life,  and  their 
obsessive  striving  for  the  man  proves  to  be  determined  by  their  rest- 
less flight  from  the  woman. 

"It  is  also  noteworthy  that  most  inverts  are  only  or  favorite  children. 
I  have  shown  elsewhere  that  such  children  are  usually  overburdened 
with  love,  and  hence  remain  insatiable  for  the  rest  of  their  lives. 
This  accounts  for  the  fact  that  when  they  tear  themselves  away  from 
their  mothers  they  often  reject  the  whole  sex." 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         315 

/  was  terrified  and  pitied  my  mother  very  much,  because  she 
was  so  gentle.  The  hair  that  came  off  resembled  the  genitals 
of  a  woman." 

The  masculine  woman  represents  the  type  of  woman  of 
"the  tiger  variety,"  whom  he  admired  so  much.  The  yellow 
color  of  the  hair  and  the  black  dress  seems  to  confirm  this 
association.  As  the  chief  actor  in  the  dream  is  the  dreamer, 
he  himself  must  be  the  masculine  woman  who  nearly  beat 
the  life  out  of  his  mother.  This  becomes  more  significant 
when  it  is  remembered  that  he  identified  himself  with  the 
tiger.  The  tearing  out  of  the  hair  which  resembled  the 
female  genitalia  is  explained  by  the  following  associations: 
When  he  was  five  years  old  he  displayed  a  morbid  curiosity 
about  his  mother's  genitalia;  he  resorted  to  many  in- 
genious ways  until  he  accomplished  his  desire.  Thus,  he 
insisted  that  his  mother  allow  him  to  button  her  shoes;  he 
also  took  every  opportunity  to  sleep  with  her.  What  im- 
pressed him  most  was  the  hair.  The  whole  dream  repre- 
sents a  sadistic  attack  on  the  object  he  loved  most.* 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  at  the  same  period  he  had 
nightmares  in  which  he  was  run  over  by  steam-engines. 
The  same  sadistic  feeling  was  later  transferred  to  his  sym- 
bolic mother  (the  mother  earth)  concerning  whom  he  talks  as 
follows:  "I  thought  a  great  deal  about  the  earth,  and  how  it 
absorbed  everything.  I  liked  to  urinate  on  it,  and  then  lie 
down  with  my  penis  on  the  ground.  I  had  a  great  affection 
for  it.  This  feeling  later  changed,  and  I  then  wanted  to 
punch  the  earth  and  women's  genitals."     (The  last  asso- 

*  Prof.  Freud's  Kleiner  Hans  showed  at  the  age  of  five  years  similar 
conscious  sadistic  feelings  toward  his  mother.  Neurosenlehre  Dritte 
Folge,  p.  67,  Deuticke,  Wien,  1913. 


316  PSYCH  ANALYSIS 

ciation  shows  the  identification  between  the  earth  and  the 
mother.)     In  addition  he  had  many  open  (Edipus  dreams. 

In  brief,  the  earth  and  the  tree  were  erotic  symbolisms 
which  unconsciously  represented  to  him  his  own  mother  and 
father.  The  sexual  impulses  for  these  inanimate  objects 
were  nothing  but  a  return  to  his  infancy  when  all  his  love- 
life  was  centered  on  his  parents,  particularly  on  his  mother. 
Later  in  life,  when  this  love  could  no  longer  be  found  in  the 
mother,  and  being  unable  to  obtain  it  in  a  normal  manner 
from  strangers,  he  returned  to  his  symbolic  mother,  and, 
like  the  giant  Antseus,  he  renewed  his  strength  every  time  he 
touched  the  earth — his  mother.* 

This  case  seems  to  confirm  the  views  expressed  by  Federn 
in  his  instructive  paper9  that  "the  active  components  of  the 
sexual  impulse  are  not  identical  with  sadism,  but  that  they 
can  only  become  transformed  into  sadism  through  peculiar 
psychic  mechanisms;  that  this  transformation  takes  place 
at  a  period  when  the  sexual  desire  is  not  yet  consciously  di- 
rected toward  the  accomplishment  of  the  sexual  act,  but  is 
perceived  in  a  vague,  immature  and  auto-erotic  manner  as 
an  active  sexual  impulse,  with  an  as  yet  undeveloped  end  aim 
of  the  sexual  activity  for  the  desired  object,  for  the  specific 
sadism  can  be  traced  in  all  cases  to  the  prepubescent,  often 
infantile,  period  of  the  individual." 

Thus,  even  in  our  matter-of-fact  times  it  is  possible  to 
find  a  person  who,  having  been  surrounded  in  childhood  by 

*  I  can  report  two  more  cases  where  the  earth  was  connected  with 
sexual  congress:  (1)  A  mild  paraphrenic  had  dreams  of  having  sexual 
relations  with  the  earth.  (2)  A  young  married  man  suffered  from 
somnambulic  states  during  which  he  cohabited  with  his  wife,  all  the 
time  imagining  that  he  was  digging  a  field  or  the  street.  In  both  cases 
there  was  a  strong  mother  fixation. 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT    OF    DREAMS         317 

a  phantastic,  unreal  world  of  fairy  tales,  fables  and  myths, 
developed  into  a  strange  being  not  unlike  a  character  of  the 
pre-Homeric  period,  entirely  out  of  harmony  with  modern 
cultural  life.*  There  is  no  denying  that  this  is  a  unique  case; 
but,  although  I  have  not  seen  another  psychoneurotic  with 
such  a  pronounced  archaic  make-up,  I  have,  nevertheless,  ob- 
served many  persons  who  showed  the  same  mechanisms  in  a 
lesser  degree.  Thus,  I  can  mention  the  case  of  an  intelligent 
business  man  of  fifty  years,  who  cannot  fall  asleep  without 
living  through  for  at  least  an  hour,  sometimes  even  longer, 
some  distorted  story  from  fairy  books  or  mythology.  He 
vainly  tried  everything  imaginable  to  rid  himself  of  this 
disagreeable  obsession,  which  was  directly  traceable  to  his 
childhood  when  he  was  read  to  sleep  by  fairy  tales  and 
similar  stuff.  As  he  reached  puberty  these  stories  became 
distorted  and  assumed  an  erotic  tinge,  and  he  then  noticed 
that  these  episodes  were  regularly  followed  by  an  attack  of 
palpitation,  which  was  worse  if  he  made  an  effort  to  abstain 
from  his  abnormal  fancies.  These  fancies  sometimes  ob- 
truded themselves  during  the  day  and  entirely  incapacitated 
him.  I  have  seen  two  other  adults,  both  sadistic,  who 
suffered  from  similar  afflictions.  In  both  cases  the  fairy 
tales  were  so  distorted  as  to  be  almost  beyond  recognition, 
but  there  was  no  doubt  about  their  origin. 

It  is  in  young  children,  however,  where  one  often  sees  the 
evil  effects  of  sadistic  fairy  tales.  Within  the  last  few  years 
I  have  seen  a  number  of  children  who  were  suffering  from 
flavor  nocturnus  and  diverse  phobias,  in  whom  the  symptoms 

*  It  is  now  about  two  years  since  this  patient  was  cured  by  psych- 
analysis.  He  has  remained  perfectly  well  and  shows  no  trace  of  his 
symptoms. 


318  PSYCHANALYSIS 

were  directly  determined  by  some  terrifying  fairy  story. 
Thus,  a  boy  of  six  years  suddenly  became  excitable  and 
anxious,  he  was  afraid  to  sleep  alone,  and  showed  many 
typical  attacks  of  anxiety.  Investigation  showed  that  he 
belonged  to  those  children  who  are  constantly  amused  by 
their  parents  and  nurses.  He  was  passionately  fond  of 
stories,  which  were  read  and  told  to  him  for  hours  daily. 
His  attacks  were  largely  determined  by  such  stories  as 
Jack  the  Giant  Killer,  The  Boy  Who  Did  Not  Know  How  to 
Shiver  and  others  of  a  similar  nature.  To  be  sure,  the 
anxiety  as  such  has  a  different  origin,  but  there  is  no  doubt 
that  the  sadistic  and  masochistic  stories  helped  to  develop  or 
to  keep  alive  abnormal  sexual  tendencies. 

Asnaourow  reported  the  case  of  a  boy  of  five  years10  who 
was  aroused  sexuallv  when  his  nurse  told  him  the  story7  of 
Cyrus  the  Younger,  who  caused  one  of  his  most  distinguished 
friends  to  be  whipped.  This  boy  later  became  a  homosexual 
masochist.  I  have  observed  a  few  similar  cases  of  which 
I  shall  mention  two.  A  homosexual  with  sadistic  tendencies 
related  to  me  that  as  a  young  boy,  probably  at  about  the 
age  of  six  years,  he  heard  the  story  of  Aladdin's  Wonderful 
Lamp,  and  it  immediately  became  the  object  of  his  fancies. 
On  going  to  sleep  he  imagined  himself  the  possessor  of  this 
omnipotent  lamp,  and  by  means  of  it  caused  the  genii  to  do 
his  bidding.  Most  of  his  wishes  had  to  do  with  whipping 
and  torturing  some  one. 

Another  patient  suffering  from  active  and  passive  algo- 
lagnia with  erotic  zoophilia  for  horses  was  not  only  fed  on 
fairy  tales  of  all  description,  but  at  a  very  early  age  he  was 
fascinated  by  Froissart's  Chronicles  and  Bible  Steps  for 
Little  Pilgrims.    These  books,  especially  the  former,  con- 


FAIRY    TALES    AS    A    DETERMINANT   OF    DREAMS         319 

tain  many  lurid  pictures  of  head-cutting,  murders  and 
assassinations  by  knights  on  horseback.  At  the  age  of  six 
years  a  little  girl  appealed  to  him,  and  the  thought  came  to 
him  that  her  head  should  be  cut  off.  At  the  age  of  eight 
years  he  had  a  dream  in  which  he  was  a  knight  and  his  head 
was  about  to  be  cut  off. 

In  brief,  psychanalysis  of  patients  often  shows  the  direct 
harmful  effects  of  sadistic  reading  material  in  childhood. 
This  is  not  to  be  surprised  at  when  one  remembers  that 
pain  is  intimately  related  to  sex.11 

Besides  the  cases  that  I  have  reported  I  have  seen  others 
who,  although  showing  no  algolagnia,  are  phantastic  dreamers 
entirely  unfit  to  cope  with  the  stern  realities  of  modern  life. 
Having  been  imbued  in  childhood  with  the  omnipotence  of 
the  fairy-book  heroes,  they  wish  to  be  like  them,  and  later 
refuse,  or  find  it  hard,  to  become  plain  citizens  struggling 
for  existence.  Such  individuals  are  constantly  wishing  for 
the  unattainable  that  could  only  be  gotten  through  some  of 
the  charms  of  fairyland,  such  as  magic  boots,  invisible  caps, 
Aladdin's  Lamp,  the  Garuda  Stone  and  so  on.  It  is,  there- 
fore, no  wonder  that  such  persons  are  unhappy  as  adults 
and  think  themselves  out  of  place  among  ordinary  mortals. 
Wanke  justly  asks12:  "Of  what  benefit  is  it  for  the  child  to  read 
fairy  tales  where  there  is  so  much  about  murder  and  killing, 
and  where  human  life  is  treated  in  the  most  careless  manner 
as  if  it  amounted  to  nothing  ?  What  does  the  child  gain  by 
reading  about  criminal  acts  which  bring  no  serious  conse- 
quences on  the  person  perpetrating  them?"13 

Cases,  such  as  here  described,  clearly  show  the  harm  that 
such  reading  may  do. 


320  PSYCHANALYSIS 

References 

1.  Cf.  the  works  of  Jung,  Riklin,  Abraham,  Rank,  Putnam    and 
Jones. 

2.  Freud:  Miirchenstoffe  in  Traumen,  Internat.  Zeitschrift  f.  Arzt- 
Uche  Psychoanalyse,  Vol.  I,  Heft  2. 

3.  Interpretation  of  Dreams,  p.  234. 

4.  Russian  Folk-Lore,  translated  by  Helen  Schoenberg. 

5.  Brill:  The  Conception  of  Homosexuality,  case  111,  Jour.  Amer. 
Med.  Assoc,  Aug.  2,  1913. 

6.  Freud:  Ueber  Infantile  Sexualtheorien  Neurosenlehre,  2d  Series. 

7.  Cf.  Inman:  Ancient  Pagan  and  Modern  Christian  Symbolism, 
p.  112;  also  Freud:  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams,  p.  242,  foot-note. 

8.  Havelock  Ellis:  Erotic  Symbolism,  p.  5. 

9.  Beitriige  zur  Analyse  des  Sadismus  und  Masochismus,  Internat. 
Zeitschrift  f.  Arztliche  Psychoanalyse,  Jan.,  1913. 

10.  Monatschefte  fur  Padagogic  und  Schulpolitick,  No.  10,  1912. 

11.  See  above,  p.  252.     Cf.  also  Havelock  Ellis:  Analysis  of  the 
Sexual  Impulse,  pp.  56-152. 

12.  Psychiatrie  u.  Padagogic  Grenzfragen  dea  Nerven  und  Seelen- 
leben. 

13.  Quoted  by  Asnaourow:   Sadismus,  Masochismus,  p.  11. 


CHAPTER  XIII 
ANAL  EROTICISM  AND  CHARACTER 

In  his  Three  Contributions  to  the  Sexual  Theory  Freud 
shows  that  the  sexual  impulse  in  man  consists  of  many 
components  and  partial  impulses.  Many  essential  con- 
tributions to  the  sexual  excitement  are  furnished  by  the 
peripheral  excitement  of  certain  parts  of  the  body,  such  as 
the  genitals,  mouth,  anus  and  bladder  outlets  which  we 
call  erogenous  zones.  All  these  zones  are  active  in  infancy 
and  only  some  of  them  go  to  make  up  the  sexual  life.  The 
others  are  deflected  from  the  sexual  aims  and  utilized  for 
other  purposes.  This  is  the  process  of  sublimation. 
During  the  sexual  latency  period — four  to  beginning  of 
puberty,  eleven — reaction  formations  like  shame,  loathing 
and  morality,  are  formed  in  the  psychic  life  of  the  indi- 
vidual at  the  cost  of  the  excitements  furnished  by  these 
erogenous  zones,  which  act  as  dams  for  the  later  sexual 
activity.  The  anal  zone  is  one  of  the  components  of  the 
sexual  impulse  which,  though  active  in  infancy,  falls  into 
disuse  in  the  course  of  development,  for  our  present  cul- 
tural life  does  not  use  it  for  sexual  purposes.  It  is  the 
reaction  formation  of  this  zone  that  I  shall  here  discuss. 

In  the  course  of  psychanalysis  we  come  across  patients 
who  tell  us  that  it  took  them  a  long  time  to  learn  to  con- 
trol their  bowels.    These  patients  recall  that  even  in  the 

later  years  of  childhood  they  occasionally  met  with  an 
21  321 


322  PSYCHANALYSI8 

accident.  When  we  investigate  still  further  we  find  that 
they  belonged  to  that  class  of  infants  who  refused  to  empty 
their  bowels  when  placed  on  the  chamber  because  defecation 
caused  them  pleasure.  A  number  of  my  patients  clearly 
recalled  that  even  in  later  years  they  obtained  pleasure 
by  withholding  their  movements,  and  that  they  took  an 
unusual  interest  in  their  fecal  excretions.  This  usually 
shows  that  their  sexual  constitution  brought  along  an 
enhanced  erogenous  significance  of  the  anal  zone.  As  they 
grew  older  all  these  activities  disappeared,  and  instead 
they  manifested  a  triad  of  qualities  which  were  described 
by  Freud  in  his  article  on  Character  and  Anal  Eroticism.1 
To  illustrate  this  character  I  shall  cite  the  following  case. 

X.,  forty-four  years  old,  divorced,  a  very  successful  merchant,  waa 
referred  to  me  for  treatment  by  Dr.  F.  Peterson.  The  patient  stated 
that  his  present  illness  dated  back  to  his  twentieth  year.  On  exami- 
nation it  was  found  that  he  presented  a  typical  compulsion  neurosis,2 
and  that  some  of  the  compulsive  ideas  were  as  follows.  When  eating 
soup  he  would  think  it  urine;  when  eating  sausage  he  would  have  to 
think  of  feces.  The  noise  of  an  auto  horn  made  him  think  of  a 
flatus  or  horse's  flatus,  on  account  of  which  he  gave  up  automobile 
riding.  On  going  to  sleep  he  became  obsessed  by  visions  of  people 
having  movements  of  the  bowels.  A  woman's  mouth  made  him  think 
of  the  rectum,  her  eyes  recalled  the  anus.  Shaking  hands  with  a 
person  recalled  a  man  using  toilet  paper.  Looking  at  big  fat  persons 
would  obsess  him  with  thoughts  of  their  fecal  excrements,  the  size, 
consistency,  etc.  A  person  with  protruding  teeth  would  recall  feces 
protruding  from  the  anus.     The  moon  constantly  recalled  the  rectum. 

These  are  only  a  few  of  the  many  dozens  of  similar  com- 
pulsive ideas  which  forever  obsessed  him.  Besides  the 
obsessions  he  suffered  from  chronic  constipation  and  from 
many  other  somatic  disturbances. 

On  hearing  this  voluminous  skatological  story  I  natu- 


ANAL    EROTICISM    AND    CHARACTER  323 

rally  thought  of  the  anal  eroticism,  and  the  more  I  became 
acquainted  with  my  patient  the  completer  the  picture 
became. 

Now  Freud  describes  the  persons  showing  the  anal 
eroticism  as  being  especially  orderly,  economical,  and 
obstinate.  Every  one  of  these  terms  embraces  a  small 
group  or  series  of  allied  characteristic  features.  Thus 
orderly  includes  physical  cleanliness  as  well  as  scrupulosity 
in  little  things;  its  opposite  would  be  disorder  and  negli- 
gence. Economy  may  shade  into  avariciousness;  obsti- 
nacy may  lead  to  spite  and  to  a  tendency  for  violence  and 
revengeful  acts.  It  is  the  last  two — economy  and  obsti- 
nacy— that  hang  most  firmly  together,  and  are  most  con- 
stantly encountered,  though  the  third  is  often  found  in 
the  same  person. 

X.  dressed  and  looked  very  neat  and  gentlemanly.  He 
was  very  conventional,  moved  in  very  good  circles,  and 
tried  to  make  the  impression  that  he  was  very  particular 
about  society  matters.  Thus,  he  often  referred  to  his 
friend  as  not  a  gentleman  because  he  would  not  always 
put  on  evening  dress  for  theater.  The  slightest  infraction 
of  the  general  rule  offended  him.  He  lived  in  the  best 
hotels  and  belonged  to  some  very  fine  clubs.  From  his 
history  I  found  that  he  was  extremely  self  willed  and 
obstinate.  He  hated  all  his  brothers  because  they  claimed 
that  he  thought  he  knew  it  all,  and  he  would  give  me 
many  instances  to  show  that  he  really  was  superior  to 
them.  This  characteristic  was  not  only  apparent  in 
his  dealings  with  his  family,  but  with  everyone  else 
including  doctors.  He  consulted  physicians  in  almost 
every  principal  city  of  the  U.  S.  and  abroad  and  spoke 


324  PSYCHANALYSIS 

disparagingly  of  all.  He  had  also  been  a  Christian  Scien- 
tist and  a  New  Thoughter,  but  as  they  did  not  benefit  him 
he  put  them  on  the  same  level  with  the  doctors.  It  was 
often  very  amusing  to  hear  him  speak  of  doctors  I  knew, 
and  I  have  no  doubt  that  I  fare  no  better  when  he  talks 
to  others.  His  obstinacy  and  revenge  led  him  to  enter 
into  commercial  competition  with  his  own  brothers,  and 
when  his  older  brother  implored  his  help  and  threatened 
to  blow  out  his  own  brains  because  of  financial  ruin  he 
not  only  refused  to  assist  him,  but  said  to  him:  "Not  a 
cent!  Shoot  yourself;  do  you  remember  how  you  treated 
me?"  (revenge  and  spite). 

As  an  illustration  of  his  financial  dealings  I  shall  cite 
an  experience  I  had  with  him.  As  I  said  above  he  was 
Dr.  Peterson's  patient,  and  I  first  saw  him  in  Dr.  P.'s 
office.  He  became  unusually  friendly,  and  as  soon  as  an 
opportunity  presented  itself  he  proposed  that  if  I  charge 
him  less  for  the  treatment  he  would  leave  Dr.  P.  and  come 
to  me.  I  told  him  politely  that  I  could  not  think  of  enter- 
taining such  a  proposition,  and  that  things  would  have  to 
remain  as  they  were.  A  few  weeks  later  he  saw  P. 
unknown  to  me,  and  told  him  that  he  was  poor  and  unable 
to  continue  with  the  treatment  unless  his  fees  were  reduced. 
Dr.  P.,  not  knowing  the  true  circumstances,  reduced  his 
fee  50  per  cent.  That  same  week  he  invested  many 
thousands  in  a  new  business  venture  in  New  York  City. 
More  than  this,  when  his  bill  was  sent  to  him  at  the  end 
of  the  month  he  sent  a  check  for  about  one-tenth  of  the 
amount  on  account.  It  is  now  about  two  years  since  the 
treatment  ceased  and  he  still  sends  us  small  amounts  from 
time  to  time.     I  may  here  mention  that  he  is  a  very  wealthy 


ANAL    EROTICISM    AND    CHARACTER  325 


man  and  owns  large  interests  in  a  number  of  big  com- 
mercial houses.  His  dealings  with  other  people  were 
of  a  similar  nature.  Thus,  I  prescribed  some  medicine 
for  him  and  he  then  complained  that  the  druggist  was  a 
highway  robber.  He  lost  the  friendship  of  many  people 
because  of  his  stinginess.  I  have  this  from  his  own 
account.  In  fine  he  was  what  people  would  call  a  miser, 
though  to  all  appearances  he  looked  like  a  generous 
gentleman.  As  a  business  man  he  was  a  great  success 
because,  as  he  said,  "  I  knew  how  to  manage  things,  and 
I  could  always  be  relied  upon." 

The  extreme  neatness,  orderliness,  and  reliability  in 
our  patient  are  nothing  but  reaction  formations  against 
the  interest  in  the  not  neat  or  dirty  which  is  not  a  part 
of  the  body. 

During  the  analysis  I  found  that  as  a  child  the  patient 
had  a  hard  time  to  control  his  rectum.  He  was  punished 
and  jeered  for  regularly  soiling  himself  up  to  his  sixth 
year.  At  nine  years  he  was  sent  home  from  school  in 
disgrace  because  he  broke  wind  in  the  class  room.  This 
was  recalled  under  marked  emotivity.  He  stated  that 
it  was  a  mixed  class  of  boys  and  girls  which  made  it  still 
harder  to  bear.  The  following  year  he  met  with  another 
accident  while  following  a  parade.  He  received  a  rather 
severe  spanking  for  it  because  he  had  on  a  new  white  suit. 
The  patient  also  recalled  that  as  early  as  in  his  fifth  year 
he  had  the  habit  of  sticking  his  finger  into  his  rectum,  a 
habit  which  he  continued  for  years. 

Whether  he  was  one  of  these  infants  who  held  back  his 
stools  I  could  not  discover,  but  as  far  as  his  memory 


320  PSYCHANALYSIS 

reached  there  was  an  extreme  interest  for  feces  and  for 
the  gluteal  region. 

It  is  not  simple  to  connect  the  interest  in  defecation 
with  obstinacy  but  we  must  remember  that  even  infants 
can  be  self  willed  when  put  on  the  chamber,  and  that 
painful  irritations  of  the  skin  connected  with  the  anal 
zone  (spanking)  are  utilized  to  break  the  child's  obstinacy. 
We  all  know  that  when  people  wish  to  express  spite  or 
spiteful  mocking  they  invite  people  to  kiss  their  behind, 
which  points  to  a  repressed  pleasure.  As  a  child  our 
patient  was  very  often  spanked  not  only  by  his  parents 
but  by  his  older  brother.  One  incident  which  he  espe- 
cially remembered  was  a  very  brutal  treatment  by  his 
older  brother. 

The  relation  between  defecation  and  money  though 
seemingly  remote  still  shows  a  definite  connection.  Some 
of  you  know  that  the  most  obstinate  cases  of  constipation 
can  be  cured  by  psychanalysis.  Of  course  they  can  also 
be  cured  by  other  means  such  as  hypnotism,  but  by 
psychanalysis  they  can  be  cured  only  after  the  money 
complex  of  the  patient  has  been  thoroughly  thrashed  out 
and  brought  to  consciousness.  We  know  that  misers  are 
called  filthy  (filthy  lucre),  and  that  in  mythology,  fairy 
tales,  superstitions,  and  dreams  money  is  intimately 
connected  with  feces  (goose  that  laid  the  golden  egg).  In 
the  old  Babylonian  writings  gold  is  the  dung  of  hell.3 
It  is  also  probable  that  the  contrast  between  the  most 
valuable  that  man  has  learned  to  know  and  the  least 
valuable  which  he  ejects  as  refuse  has  formed  the  identi- 
fication. This  identification  is  also  strengthened  by  the 
fact  that  when  the  erotic  interest  in  defecation  ceases  the 
interest   in    money,  which  was   lacking  during   childhood, 


ANAL    EROTICISM    AND    CHARACTER  327 

begins.     The  yellow  color  which  is  common  to  gold  and 
feces  probably  forms  another  association. 

It  may  also  be  mentioned  that  the  triad  of  qualities  are 
not  found  in  those  persons  who  retain  the  anus  as  an 
erogenous  zone;  e.g.,  homosexual  pederasts.  Those 
whom  I  know  are  all  very  generous  indeed.  The  treat- 
ment of  X.  had  to  be  stopped  on  account  of  his  money 
complex  at  the  end  of  about  two  months,  although  he 
admitted  that  he  was  much  benefited  by  the  analysis. 
When  he  first  came  for  treatment  he  was  so  annoyed  by 
the  obsession  caused  by  the  noise  of  auto  horns  that  he 
promised  me  75  per  cent,  of  his  income  if  I  rid  him  of  it. 
After  a  few  weeks'  analysis  this  and  some  other  obses- 
sions were  removed.  He  was  very  pleased  and  surprised  and 
thought  it  was  miraculous,  but  notwithstanding  all  this 
it  was  impossible  for  him  to  pay  a  moderate  fee  for  his 
treatment.  As  far  as  I  have  gone  the  analysis  showed 
an  accentuation  of  the  anal  zone  in  infancy,  a  retarded 
repression  with  its  reaction  formation,  as  shown  by  his 
character,  and  then  a  failure  of  the  repression  at  the  age  of 
20  years  with  a  negative  revival  of  the  anal  activity  in  the 
form  of  the  skatological  obsessions. 

Case  II. — T.,  thirty  years  old,  suffered  for  years  from  a  compulsion 
neurosis,  which  manifested  itself  in  obsessions,  doubts  and  phobias. 
To  save  time  I  shall  merely  state  that  he  soiled  himself  up  to  the  age  of 
three  years,  and  from  his  mother's  account  he  was  almost  never  free 
from  bowel  trouble  until  the  age  of  five  years.  The  neurosis  mani- 
fested itself  at  fifteen  years,  and  besides  many  obsessive  thoughts  he 
was  also  troubled  by  an  obsessive  act.  He  could  not  resist  the  impulse 
to  rub  his  feces  on  walls,  and  at  times  on  his  body.  T.  stated  that 
he  had  the  habit  of  holding  back  his  bowels  because  it  gave  him  a 
distinct  feeling  of  pleasure  and  stimulated  his  mental  activity.  When- 
ever he  was  confronted  with  a  difficult  task  he  "  practised  const ipa- 


328  PSYCHANALYSIS 

tion."  As  an  example  he  gave  the  following  episode.  As  a  reporter 
for  a  newspaper  he  was  sent  to  observe  and  report  the  manoeuvres  of 
the  National  Guard.  He  was  very  anxious  to  write  nice  reports  and 
to  accomplish  this  he  would  hold  back  his  movements  for  two  to 
three  days  until  it  became  almost  unbearable,  and  he  would  then 
imagine  himself  on  the  battle  field  of  Waterloo  and  describe  what  he 
6aw.  Here,  too,  the  anal  activities  were  the  result  of  a  failure  in  the 
repression  of  an  enhanced  zone.* 

But  it  often  happens  that  in  addition  to  an  erogenous 
zone  there  is  also  a  revival  of  one  or  more  of  the  partial 
impulses.  Whenever  this  occurs  the  symptoms  usually 
show  a  corresponding  combination.  The  following  will 
serve  as  an  illustration. 

Case  III. — B.,  thirty-nine  years  old,  suffered  from  a  compulsion 
neurosis.  He  was  obsessed  with  doubts  and  phobias  which  referred 
to  definite  ideas  about  people  being  killed.  It  would  be  impossible 
to  give  here  a  description  of  this  very  interesting  case  which  I  hope  to 
report  in  full  at  some  future  date.  I  simply  wish  to  state  that  he 
too,  showed  an  enhanced  anal  activity  in  infantile  fife,  although  not 
nearly  so  marked  as  in  the  other  cases.  But  the  most  prominent 
factor  in  his  infantile  sexuality  was  the  component  of  cruelty.  B. 
was  taught  to  use  firearms  at  a  very  early  age.  His  greatest  pleasure 
up  to  the  age  of  nine  to  ten  years  was  shooting  birds,  squirrels  and 
rabbits.  At  the  age  of  puberty  he  became  very  sympathetic,  and 
one  day  after  shooting  a  squirrel  he  suddenly  experienced  feelings  of 
compassion  and  remorse.  Since  then  he  found  it  very  hard  to  go  out 
shooting.  When  his  neurosis  developed  at  the  age  of  eighteen  years 
he  also  began  to  suffer  from  constipation  which  continued  ever  since 
for  fifteen  years.  No  medication  would  relieve  him  until  he  accidentally 
discovered  that  the  following  process  gave  him  a  movement  of  the 
bowels.  He  once  played  with  a  spool  of  cotton  upon  which  was  a 
picture  of  a  child.  He  rolled  it  and  when  the  child's  picture  came 
his  way  he  stuck  a  pin  into  it.     After  five  minutes  of  such  play  he 

*  I  have  recently  learned  from  this  patient's  mother  that  as  an  infant 
he  very  often  held  back  his  stools.  He  suffered  from  chronic  con- 
stipation because  he  almost  always  interrupted  the  act  of  defecation. 


ANAL    EROTICISM    AND    CHARACTER  329 

would  have  a  movement.  He  then  resorted  to  this  practice  which 
he  modified  from  time  to  time  until  he  was  cured.  He  carried  a 
number  of  long  pins  which  he  sharpened  from  time  to  time,  and  every 
morning  he  drew  a  picture  of  a  girl  and  thrust  the  pins  into  the  region 
of  the  heart.  When  he  was  very  busy  he  could  simply  draw  a 
target  on  paper  and  throw  his  pen  at  it  imagining  that  it  was  a  girl. 
As  the  years  went  by  he  resorted  to  many  other  variations.  Thus 
when  he  lived  in  the  country  he  would  shoulder  his  rifle  and  go  out 
into  the  gadren,  and  by  imagining  that  he  was  shooting  Indians  his 
bowels  were  soon  stimulated  to  activity.  Sometimes  he  imagined 
himself  fighting,  which  gave  the  same  result.  On  one  occasion  while 
throwing  his  pins  at  a  picture  one  of  them  fell  through  the  window 
into  the  garden,  and  as  childern  were  wont  to  play  there,  he  soon 
became  obsessed  with  the  idea  that  one  of  the  children  might  swallow 
the  pin  and  die.  This  was  the  first  obsession  of  this  kind  and  it  con- 
tinued in  different  forms. 

All  these  patients  showed  a  special  interest  in  their  anal 
activities  in  childhood  and  in  adult  life.  Later  when  the 
infantile  activities  of  the  anal  zone  remained  in  a  state  of 
repression  they  belonged  to  that  class  of  persons  who  pro- 
long the  act  of  defecation  by  reading  books  and  newspapers 
in  the  water-closet.  Thus  X.  referred  to  the  water-closet  as 
his  library.  .With  the  onset  of  the  neurosis  which  signified 
a  failure  of  repression,  the  originally  enhanced  anal  activi- 
ties came  to  the  surface  in  the  form  of  symptoms;  i.e.,  the 
neurosis  represented  the  negative  of  the  perversion. 

The  analyses  of  these  as  well  as  of  a  number  of  other 
cases  fully  corroborate  Freud's  formula;  viz.,  that  the 
permanent  distinguishing  traits  of  a  person  are  either 
unchanged  continuations  of  the  original  impulses,  sub- 
liminations  of  the  same,  or  reactions  formed  against  them. 

References 

1.  Sammlung  kleiner  Schriften  zur  Neurosenlehre,  2d  Series  p.  132. 

2.  Cf.  Chap.  IV. 

3.  Freud:  Anal  Erotic,  I.  c. 


CHAPTER  XIV 
FREUD'S  THEORY  OF  WIT 

Its  Relation  to  the  Dream  and  Unconscious 

When  we  examine  the  literature  on  wit  from  Aristotle 
to  our  present  time,  we  are  struck  by  the  fact  that  despite 
universality  of  wit  comparatively  little  has  been  written  on 
the  subject,  and  that  although  many  excellent  theories 
have  been  advanced,  notably  by  Jean  Paul,  Theodore 
Vischer,  and  Fischer,  none  of  these  authors  has  gone 
deeply  enough  into  the  subject. 

Without  entering  into  detailed  descriptions  I  shall  simply 
state  that  the  characteristic  qualities  of  wit  as  given  by 
the  most  prominent  authors  are  the  following:  activity, 
the  relation  of  the  content  of  wit  to  our  thoughts,  the 
character  of  the  playing  judgment,  the  union  of  dissimilari- 
ties, contrasting  ideas,  sense  in  nonsense,  the  succession 
of  confusion  and  clearness,  the  sudden  emergence  of  the 
hidden,  and  the  peculiar  kind  of  brevity. 

On  close  examination  it  can  be  readily  seen  that  these 
qualities,  though  readily  demonstrable  by  many  examples 
of  wit,  represent  only  isolated  fragments,  and  give  us  little 
information  about  the  deeper  psychological  mechanisms 
of  wit.  Indeed  no  author  thoroughly  explains  the  indi- 
vidual determinants  of  wit.     Also  the  divisions  of  wit 

are  based  by  some  authors  on  the  technical  means,  and 

330 


freud's  theory  of  wit  331 

by  others  on  the  usage  of  wit  in  speech.  The  reason  for  all 
these  diversities  and  discrepancies  is  that,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  Freud,  no  author  penetrated  deeply  enough  into 
the  subject.  Here,  as  in  many  other  branches  of  normal 
and  abnormal  psychology  Freud  pushed  on  when  the  others 
have  stopped,  and  in  this  book,  "Der  Witz  und  sein 
Beziehung  zum  Unbewussten,"1  he  solves  the  riddle  of 
wit  as  he  solved  the  riddle  of  the  neuroses  and  psychoses. 
Following  Freud  I  have  divided  this  paper  into  the 
analytical,  synthetical,  and  theoretical  parts. 

THE  TECHNIQUE  OF  WIT 

DeQuincey  once  remarked  that  old  persons  are  apt  to 
fall  into  "  anecdotage."  The  word  anecdotage,  though  in 
itself  incomprehensible,  can  be  readily  analysed  to  show 
its  original  full  sense;  and  on  analysis  we  find  that  it  is 
made  up  of  two  words,  anecdote  and  dotage.  That  is, 
instead  of  saying  that  old  persons  are  apt  to  fall  into 
dotage,  and  that  old  persons  are  fond  of  telling  anecdotes, 
DeQuincey  fuses  the  two  words  together  forming  a  ne- 
ologism, anecdotage,  and  thus  simultaneously  expresses 
both  ideas.  The  technique,  therefore,  lies  in  the  fusion  of 
the  two  words.  Such  a  fusion  of  words  is  called  condensa- 
tion. Condensation  is  not  a  simple  composition  formed 
by  the  joining  of  the  two  words;  there  is  a  substitutive 
formation,  i.e.,  instead  of  anecdote  and  dotage  we  get 
anecdotage. 

In  a  short  story  that  I  have  recently  read,  one  of  the 
characters,  a  "sport,"  speaks  of  the  Christmas  season  as 
the  alchoholidays.     By  reduction  it  can  be  easily  seen  that 


332  PSYCHANALYSIS 

we  have  here  a  compound  word,  a  combination  of  alcohol 
and  holidays,  which  can  be  graphically  represented  as  fol- 
lows: 

alcoHOL 

HOLidavs 


ALCOHOLIDAYS 


Here  the  condensation  expresses  the  idea  that  holidays 
are  conducive  to  alcoholic  indulgence.  In  other  words, 
we  have  here  a  fused  word,  which,  though  strange  in 
appearance,  can  be  easily  understood  in  its  proper  con- 
text. This  witticism  may  be  described  as  a  condensation 
with  substitution. 

The  same  mechanism  is  found  in  the  following:  A 
dramatic  critic  summarizing  three  paragraphs  to  the 
effect  that  most  plays  produced  in  New  York  City 
are  violent,  emotional  and  hysterical,  remarks,  "Thespis 
has  taken  up  his  home  in  Dramatteawan."  The  substi- 
tution not  only  expresses  the  critic's  idea  that  most  of 
the  plays  at  present  produced  in  this  city  are  violent, 
emotional,  and  hysterical,  that  is  insane,  but  it  also 
contains  a  clever  allusion  to  the  nature  of  the  problems 
presented  by  most  of  these  plays.  Matteawan  is  a  state 
hospital  for  criminal  insane.  Most  of  the  plays  are  not 
only  insane  but  also  criminal,  since  they  treat  of  murders, 
divorces,  robberies,  scandals,  etc. 

A  jest  which  not  long  ago  went  the  rounds  in  Europe 
referred  to  the  late  King  Leopold  as  Cleopold,  on  account 
of  his  attachment  to  an  actress  whose  first  name  was  Cleo. 
This  scandalous  allusion  is  here  produced  by  the  addition 
of  a  single  letter.2 


freud's  theory  of  wit  333 

The  examples  thus  far  described  come  under  the  group 
of  substitutive  formation  (Ersatzbildung).  Brevity, 
which  Shakespeare  calls  the  soul  of  wit,3  is  common  to 
them  all;  but  brevity  alone  is  not  wit,  else  every  laconism 
would  be  wit;  it  must  be  a  special  kind  of  brevity.  In- 
vestigation shows  that  the  brevity  of  the  joke  is  often  due 
to  a  special  process  which  leaves  its  definite  mark  in  the 
wording  of  the  wit.  This  is  the  process  of  substitutive 
formation.  If  we  apply  the  process  of  reduction  to  the 
wit,  we  find  that  wit  depends  solely  on  the  verbal  expres- 
sion produced  by  the  process  of  condensation.  As  yet, 
however,  we  do  not  understand  how  the  process  of  con- 
densation produces  the  most  valuable  part  of  wit,  namely, 
the  resultant  pleasure  (Lustgewinn). 

Condensation  not  only  plays  a  part  in  wit,  but  also  in 
dreams.  We  know  that  the  dream  is  divided  into  the 
manifest  and  the  latent  thoughts.4  The  latent  thoughts 
are  the  actual  thoughts  underlying  the  dream,  while  the 
manifest  thoughts,  which  are  usually  absurd  and  in  appear- 
ance meaningless,  are  those  which  are  recalled  by  the 
dreamer  on  awakening.  The  dream-work  is  the  name 
given  to  the  psychic  processes  which  are  responsible  for 
the  transformation  of  the  latent  into  the  manifest  thoughts 
of  the  dream,  and  condensation  may  be  named  as  one  of 
these  processes.  Words,  pictures,  ideas,  and  events  are 
all  subject  to  the  process  of  condensation.  It  may 
produce  composite  pictures  resembling  one  object  or 
person  up  to  a  certain  ingredient  or  variation  which  is 
drawn  from  another  source.  Thus  one  of  my  patients 
saw  in  her  dream  a  creature  resembling  a  centaur.  She 
soon  recognized  the  head  as  that  of  a  male  acquaintance, 


334  PSYCHANALYSIS 

but  the  body,  which  was  that  of  a  horse,  presented  here  a 
sexual  symbolism.5 

From  word  condensation  we  shall  now  turn  to  thought 
condensation,  and  to  illustrate  this  form  the  following 
wit  ticism  may  be  cited.  A  corporal  shouts  to  his  recruits 
during  drill,  "Keep  it  up,  boys;  courage  and  perseverance 
bring  everything;  the  egg  of  Columbus  was  not  laid  in  a 
day." 

This  jest  is  formed  by  the  condensation  of  two  separate 
items — the  saying,  "Rome  was  not  built  in  a  day,"  and 
the  anecdote  of  the  egg  of  Columbus.  What  the  corporal 
meant  to  say  was,  "All  that  you  boys  need  is  practice;  it 
is  as  simple  as  it  was  for  Columbus  to  stand  the  egg  on  end; 
don't  be  discouraged,  Rome  was  not  built  in  a  day."  He 
fused  these  two  ideas,  however,  and  thus  produced  the 
substitutive  formation,  "the  egg  of  Columbus  was  not 
laid  in  a  day,"  which  on  account  of  its  absurdity  and 
incongruity  carries  the  wit  of  the  jest.  Similar  mechan- 
isms are  found  in  dreams,  but  before  continuing  with  our 
investigation  of  the  analogies  between  the  mechanism 
of  wit  and  of  the  dream,  we  will  examine  the  other  proc- 
esses producing  wit. 

Hood  once  remarked  that  he  had  to  be  a  lively  Hood 
for  a  livelihood.  As  can  be  readily  seen  the  technique 
of  this  witticism  is  no  longer  condensation  with  substitu- 
tive formation,  as  it  shows  neither  an  omission  nor 
an  abbreviation.  The  thought  is  fully  expressed  as  the 
speaker  intended  it.  "I  have  to  be  a  lively  Hood  for  a 
livelihood."  What,  then,  is  the  technique  of  this  witti- 
cism? If  we  apply  our  method  of  reduction  we  find  that 
the  wit  remains  intact  as  long  as  we  preserve  the  name, 


freud's  theory  of  wit  335 

but  that  as  soon  as  we  replace  it  by  another  name,  let 
us  say  Brown,  every  trace  of  wit  disappears.  This 
points  to  the  fact  that  the  wit  lies  in  a  twofold  amplication 
of  the  name,  first  by  itself,  and  then  as  a  suffix.  I  recall  an 
excellent  Italian  jeu  d'esprit  of  a  like  nature.  At  a  court 
ball,  in  Italy,  Napoleon  Bonaparte  brusquely  remarked 
to  a  very  brilliant  lady,  "Tutti  gli  Italiani  danzano  si 
male"  (all  Italians  dance  so  badly),  to  which  she  quickly 
replied,  "Non  tutti  ma  buona  parte"  (Buonaparte). 
The  lady's  answer  has  a  double  meaning;  it  may  mean, 
"Not  all,  but  a  great  many"  (buona  parte);  or  the  words 
"buona  parte"  may  be  read  as  one  word  and  then  her 
answer  has  a  totally  different  significance.  It  becomes  a 
sharp  retort  to  Napoleon  Buonaparte's  insulting  remark, 
"Not  all  Italians  dance  badly,  but  Buonaparte  does." 
The  wit  here  lies  in  the  double  application  of  the  name, 
first  as  a  whole  and  then  divided  in  syllables  like  a  charade, 
thus, 

buona  parte 
Buonaparte 

The  twofold  application  of  the  same  words,  once  as  a 
whole  and  once  divided  into  syllables,  is  not  the  only 
technique  differing  from  the  technique  of  condensation. 
There  are  a  great  many  other  ways  in  which  the  same  word 
or  words  may  be  used  in  order  to  serve  as  a  technical 
means  of  wit.  A  witty  jest  may  be  produced  by  using 
the  same  words  a  second  time,  only  slightly  changed  in 
their  order.  The  slighter  the  change  the  better  the 
technique.     The  following  will  illustrate  the  point : 

At  a  ball  in  Washington  a  finished  coquette  gave  Senator 


336  PSYCHANALYSIS 

Chauncey  M.  Depcw  her  fan  to  hold,  and  asked  him  if  he 
could  flirt  a  fan.  "No,"  he  replied,  "but  I  can  fan  a 
flirt."  (New  York  Times,  March  13,  1910.)  This  witty 
jest  was  produced  by  merely  changing  the  order  of  the 
words  "flirt  fan"  to  "fan  flirt."  It  may  also  be  taken 
as  a  good  example  of  repartee. 

Oliver  "Wendell  Holmes  said,  "Put  not  your  trust  in 
money,  but  put  your  money  in  trust."  Here,  too,  the 
witticism  depends  mostly  on  the  transposition  of  the 
same  words. 

The  manifold  application  of  the  same  material  can  be 
greatly  extended  if  the  word  or  words  carrying  the  wit  are 
used  first  in  one  form  and  then  slightly  modified.  Thus, 
the  old  classical  saying,  "Amantes  Amentes"  (lovers, 
lunatics)  is  an  excellent  example  of  this  subgroup.  The 
striking  similarity  between  the  two  words  serves  to 
illustrate  the  close  resemblance  between  love  and 
insanity. 

Some  words  lose  their  full  meaning  when  used  in  certain 
connections,  as  shown  in  the  following  examples.  Some- 
body observed  to  the  younger  Charles  Mathews  that  blind 
persons  generally  appear  contented,  and  concluded  by 
asking,  "How  can  the  blind  be  happy?"  "I  suppose," 
replied  Mathews,  "  they  see  no  reason  why  they  shouldn't." 
This  depends  entirely  on  the  word  see  in  the  last  sentence, 
where  it  has  no  longer  the  full  meaning  of  seeing,  but  an 
idiomatic  significance  equivalent  to  knowing. 

The  technique  of  wit  based  on  double  meaning  forms 
another  subgroup  of  manifold  application.  Under  this 
heading  we  have  jests  utilizing  the  double  meaning  of  a 
name;  for  example,  "No  more,  Pistol;  I  would  not  have 


freud's  theory  of  wit  337 

you  go  off  here.  Discharge  yourself  of  our  company, 
Pistol."     (Henry  IV,  2.) 

Question:  "  Why  have  the  French  rejected  Lohengrin?" 
Answer:  "On  Elsass's  account."6 

We  all  know  that  Cardinal  Merry  Del  Val  has  been 
blamed  for  the  awkward  Roosevelt- Vatican  episode,  and 
the  journals  the  world  over  have  predicted  his  downfall 
as  the  Pope's  Secretary  of  State.  The  following  letter 
written  to  the  New  York  Times,  by  Eva  S.  Rosseau,  sums 
up  this  popular  opinion.  "All  will  be  Merry  when  Del 
says  Val  (e)  to  the  Vatican." 

The  following  may  be  cited  as  other  examples  of  double 
meaning.  "That  Mighty  Pen.  The  superiority  of  man 
to  nature  is  continually  illustrated.  Nature  needs  an 
immense  quantity  of  quills  to  make  a  goose  with,  but  a 
man  can  make  a  goose  of  himself  with  one."  (Christian 
Register.) 

Here  the  wit  depends  entirely  on  the  double  meaning 
of  the  words  goose  and  quill,  which  are  first  used  in  their 
original  literal  sense  and  then  metaphorically.  Double 
meaning  may  also  be  produced  by  play  upon  words. 
Here  no  violence  is  done  to  the  word,  it  is  not  torn  into 
syllables,  nor  does  the  word  undergo  any  modification. 

Example:  Hostess  to  her  guests:  "Make  yourselves 
at  home;  I  always  like  my  guests  to  be  at  home."  The 
wit  is  here  produced  by  the  play  upon  the  words  at  home. 

A  physician,  leaving  the  sick  bed  of  a  wife,  remarked 

to  the  husband,  "I  don't  like  her  looks."     "I  haven't 

liked  her  looks  for  some  time,"  was  the  quick  rejoinder 

of  the  husband.7    The  physician  naturally  referred  to 

the  condition  of  the  wife,  but  he  expressed  his  apprehen- 
22 


338  PSYCHANALYSIS 

sion  in  such  words  as  to  afford  the  husband  the  means 
of  utilizing  them  to  assert  his  conjugal  aversion. 

There  is  one  thing  that  strikes  us  when  we  examine  the 
various  groups  described  above;  they  all  show  a  simple 
and  distinct  resemblance;  they  are  all  special  forms  of 
condensation.  Thus  the  manifold  application  of  the  same 
material  is  nothing  but  a  form  of  condensation,  while  the 
play  upon  words  is  merely  a  condensation  without  sub- 
stitutive formation.  In  other  words,  all  the  techniques 
mentioned  above  have  one  characteristic,  namely,  they 
all  show  a  tendency  toward  economy  of  expression.  But, 
as  was  said  above,  we  must  remember  that  not  every  tend- 
ency to  economize  expression  is  witty.  It  must  possess  a 
special  form  of  economy,  upon  which  the  efficiency  of  the 
wit  depends.  But  before  discussing  the  question  whether 
the  economy  mentioned  is  not  counterbalanced  by  the 
expenditure  of  intellectual  effort  entailed  in  the  formation 
of  such  expression,  and  the  question  who  is  the  gainer  by 
this  economy,  we  will  briefly  consider  puns. 

Puns  belong  to  the  lowest  form  of  wit.  They  can  be 
formed  with  very  little  effort.  A  mere  similarity  between 
two  words  is  enough  to  recall  the  relationship  between  the 
two  meanings.  Puns  may  be  formed  by  a  similarity  of 
structure,  sound,  or  initial  letters.  Fischer  defines  the 
pun  as  a  bad  play  on  words,  because  it  does  not  play  with 
the  word  as  a  word,  but  merely  as  a  sound.  If  we  elimi- 
nate from  the  pun  the  manifold  application  of  the  same 
material,  we  find  that  the  emphasis  lies  on  the  concurrence 
of  the  two  words  serving  to  make  the  pun;  this  is  only  a 
subgroup  of  play  upon  words.  The  following  will  serve 
as  illustrations. 


freud's  theory  of  wit  339 

The  heading  of  a  poetry  column  in  a  daily  journal  reads, 
"Verse  and  Worse." 

At  a  gathering  someone  spoke  disparagingly  of  a  certain 
drama,  and  wound  up  by  saying,  "It  was  so  poor  that  the 
first  act  had  to  be  rewritten."  "And  now  it  is  re-rotten," 
added  the  punster  of  the  gathering. 

In  both  examples  the  play  is  upon  the  words,  not  as 
words,  but  as  sounds. 

From  the  technique  of  witty  words,  which  we  have  con- 
sidered exclusively  so  far,  we  will  now  turn  to  the  technique 
of  witty  thoughts,  and  by  way  of  introduction  the  follow- 
ing examples  will  be  examined. 

Two  Jews  meet  near  a  bathing  establishment.  "  Have 
you  taken  a  bath?"  asked  one.  "How  is  that,"  answered 
the  other,  "is  one  missing?"8 

At  first  sight  it  would  seem  that  the  technique  lies  in 
the  double  meaning  of  the  word  take.  For  in  the  first  case 
the  word  is  used  in  a  colorless  idiomatic  sense,  while  in 
the  second  it  is  the  verb  in  its  full  meaning.  This  would 
be  a  case  where  the  same  word  is  taken  now  in  the  empty 
and  now  in  the  full  sense,  for  the  wit  disappears  if  instead 
of  using  "to  take  a  bath"  we  should  substitute  the  simple 
equivalent  "to  bathe."  But  on  closer  examination  we 
find  that  the  reduction  has  not  been  applied  to  the  right 
place.  For  the  jest  does  not  lie  in  the  question,  but  rather 
in  the  answer,  that  is,  in  the  counter  question,  "  How  is 
that,  is  one  missing?"  Provided  the  sense  is  not  destroyed 
this  answer  cannot  be  robbed  of  its  wit  by  any  expansion 
or  variation.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  in  the  answer  of  the 
second  Jew  the  overlooking  of  the  bath  is  more  significant 
than  the  misconception  of  the  word  take. 


340  PSYCHANALYSIS 

In  his  distress  a  man  borrowed  money  from  a  wealthy 
acquaintance.9  The  same  day  he  was  discovered  by  his 
creditor  in  a  restaurant  eating  a  dish  of  salmon  with 
mayonnaise.  The  creditor  reproached  him  in  these  words : 
"You  borrow  money  of  me  and  then  order  salmon  with 
mayonnaise.  Is  that  what  you  needed  the  money  for?" 
"I  don't  quite  understand  you,"  responded  the  debtor. 
"When  I  have  no  money  I  cannot  eat  salmon  with 
mayonnaise,  when  I  have  money  I  am  not  allowed  to 
eat  it.  Well,  when  can  I  ever  eat  salmon  with 
mayonnaise?" 

Here  we  no  longer  discover  any  double  meaning.  The 
repetition  of  the  words  " salmon  with  mayonnaise"  is  not 
"a  manifold  application"  of  the  same  material,  but  an 
actual,  identical  repetition  required  by  the  content.  It 
may  be  supposed  that  the  striking  thing  about  the  answer 
is  its  logical  character,  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  the  answer 
is  illogical.  The  debtor  endeavors  to  justify  himself  for 
spending  the  borrowed  money  on  luxuries,  and  asks  when 
he  is  to  be  allowed  to  eat  salmon.  But  this  is  not  a 
logical  question;  the  creditor  does  not  blame  him  for  eating 
salmon  on  the  day  that  he  borrows  the  money,  but 
reminds  him  that  in  his  condition  he  has  no  right  to  think 
of  such  luxuries  at  all.  The  poor  bon  vivant  disregards  this 
only  possible  sense  of  the  reproach,  and  answers  about 
something  else,  and  acts  as  though  he  did  not  under- 
stand the  reproach.  In  other  words,  the  answer  is  de- 
viated from  the  sense  of  the  reproach. 

I  could  find  no  examples  as  good  as  these  two  taken 
from  Professor  Freud's  book  to  illustrate  a  new  technique 
of  wit,  namely,  displacement.     In  both  the  examples  men- 


freud's  theory  of  wit  341 

tioned  the  technique  lies  in  the  displacement  of  the  psychic 
accent.  The  deviation  is  especially  marked  in  the  bath 
jest.  The  first  says,  "Have  you  taken  a  bath?"  The 
emphasis  lies  on  the  bath  element.  The  second  answers  as 
if  the  question  were,  "Have  you  taken  a  bath?"  The 
displacement  of  the  emphasis  is  made  possible  only  by  the 
wording  "taken  a  bath."  The  displacement  would  have 
been  impossible  if  the  question  had  been,  "Have  you 
bathed?"  The  witless  answer  would  have  been,  "  Bathe? 
What  do  you  mean?  I  don't  know  what  that  means." 
The  technique  of  this  wit  depends  on  the  displacement  of 
the  emphasis,  from  "to  bathe"  to  "to  take." 

Let  us  now  examine  in  what  relation  the  technique  of 
displacement  stands  to  the  expression  of  the  wit.  As 
shown  in  the  second  example  (salmon  with  mayonnaise) 
the  displacement-wit  is  totally  independent  of  the  verbal 
expression.  It  does  not  depend  upon  words,  but  on 
streams  of  thought.  The  elimination  of  the  wit  cannot  be 
effected  by  any  substitution  of  words  as  long  as  the  sense 
is  retained.  Reduction  is  only  possible  by  changing  the 
stream  of  thought. 

Another  example  of  pure  displacement  is  the  following: 
A  rather  shabby-looking  patient  consulted  a  famous 
specialist  about  his  malady.  After  the  doctor  examined 
him  and  gave  his  opinion  he  demanded  ten  dollars,  his 
regular  office  fee.  The  patient  thought  that  it  was  too 
much,  and  asked  for  a  reduction.  The  doctor  reduced 
his  fee  at  first  to  five  and  then  to  three  dollars,  but  the 
patient  persisted  that  it  was  still  too  high  a  fee  for  him  to 
pay.  The  doctor  becoming  impatient  exclaimed,  "If  you 
are  so  poor  why  did  you  come  to  me?     You  should  have 


342  PSYCHANALYSIS 

gone  to  a  free  clinic!"  "Nothing  is  too  expensive  for  my 
health,"  responded  the  patient. 

This  is  certainly  in  general  a  proper  attitude,  but  not  for 
this  patient.  The  answer  would  be  proper  from  the  stand- 
point of  a  wealthy  man  who  pays  his  bills  without 
demurring. 

The  analysis  of  these  examples  shows  a  certain  logical 
elaboration  which  serves  to  conceal  a  displacement  of  the 
stream  of  thought.  There  are,  however,  jokes  which, 
instead  of  logic,  display  absurdity  and  nonsense,  as  the 
following  joke. 

A  servant  girl  having  been  dismissed  demands  a  recom- 
mendation from  her  mistress.  The  latter  refuses  to  give 
it,  saying,  "I  cannot  recommend  you,  because  you  have 
not  kept  the  house  clean.  Look  at  the  dust  and  filth  in 
these  corners."  "Excuse  me,  madam,"  replied  the 
servant,  "that  is  not  my  fault;  that  dirt  and  filth  was 
there  when  I  came  a  year  ago." 

The  servant's  answer  is  certainly  absurd  on  its  face; 
she  attempts  to  excuse  her  negligence,  but  succeeds  only 
in  incriminating  herself  the  more.  Still,  on  closer  con- 
sideration, we  find  that  her  answer  is  not  as  foolish  as  it 
appears;  that  this  nonsense  contains  sense  which  turns  the 
nonsense  into  wit.  The  servant  in  giving  this  answer 
makes  herself  appear  foolish  in  order  to  show  her  mistress 
how  foolish  she  herself  is.  The  reduction  is  as  follows: 
"You  blame  me  for  not  keeping  your  house  clean;  you  are 
no  better  housekeeper  yourself.  The  dust  and  filth  were  in 
these  corners  when  I  came  here;  and,  moreover,  what 
kind  of  a  mistress  are  you  to  allow  dirt  and  filth  to  re- 
main in  your  house  for  over  a  year,  and  that,  too,  with 


freud's  theory  of  wit  343 

a  servant  in  the  house!    You  are  very  foolish  to  blame 


me  now." 


The  technique  of  this  joke  consists  in  advancing  some- 
thing apparently  absurd  and  nonsensical,  which,  however, 
discloses  a  sense  serving  to  illustrate  and  represent  some 
further  actual  absurdity  and  nonsense. 

Besides  the  examples  mentioned  in  the  two  groups, 
namely,  of  displacement  and  absurdity,  we  find  other  forms 
of  wit  showing  faulty  logic.  A  good  example  is  the 
following : 

A  friend  who  had  stopped  in  the  street  to  speak  to 
Charles  Lamb  said  to  him  carelessly  as  they  were  parting, 
"  By  the  way,  my  dear  fellow,  you  owe  me  half  a  crown." 
"On  the  contrary,"  replied  Lamb,  "it  is  you  who  owe  me 
half  a  crown;  for  if  you  will  remember,  I  asked  you  for  five 
shillings,  and  you  could  only  lend  me  two  and  six."  The 
wit  in  this  anecdote  is  due  to  false  logic.  What  Lamb  says 
may  be  true,  but  it  is  based  on  a  false  premise,  as  he 
wrongly  assumes  that  the  five  shillings  were  his. 

More  typical  examples  of  wit  based  on  faulty  logic  are 
shown  in  the  three  following  jokes  from  the  German. 

1.  A  marriage  agent  is  defending  the  girl  he  has  pro- 
posed against  the  attacks  of  the  prospective  fiance.  "I 
don't  like  the  mother-in-law,"  the  latter  remarks;  "she 
is  a  crabbed,  foolish  person."  "That's  true,  however, 
you  are  not  going  to  marry  the  mother-in-law,  but  the 
daughter."  "Yes,  but  she  is  no  longer  young,  and  she 
isn't  pretty,  either."  "That's  nothing;  if  she  isn't  young 
and  pretty  you  can  trust  her  all  the  more."  "But  she 
hasn't  much  money."  "Why  talk  of  money?  Are  you 
marrying  money?    Don't  you  want  a  wife?"     "  But  she's 


344  PSYCHANALYSIS 

a  hunchback!"     "Well,  what  of  that,  do  you  expect  her 
to  have  no  blemishes  at  all?"10 

2.  On  being  introduced  to  his  prospective  bride,  the 
young  man  is  rather  unpleasantly  disappointed,  and 
drawing  aside  the  marriage  agent,  he  reproachfully 
whispers  to  him,  "Why  have  you  brought  me  here?  She 
is  ugly  and  old,  she  squints,  has  bad  teeth  and  bleary 

eyes! "    You  can  talk  louder,"  interposes  the 

marriage  agent,  "She's  deaf,  too."11 

3.  The  prospective  bridegroom  makes  his  first  call  on 
the  future  bride  with  the  marriage  agent,  and  while 
waiting  in  the  parlor  for  the  appearance  of  the  family, 
the  agent  calls  the  young  man's  attention  to  a  glass 
closet  containing  a  handsome  silver  set.  "Just  look  at 
these  things,  you  see  how  wealthy  they  are."  "  But  isn't 
it  possible,"  asks  the  suspicious  young  man,  "that  these 
nice  things  were  borrowed  for  the  occasion  in  order  to 
give  an  impression  of  wealth?"  "What  an  idea," 
answered  the  agent,  protestingly;  "who  do  you  think 
would  lend  them  anything?"12 

In  joke  (1)  we  have  a  girl  of  advanced  age,  ugly  and 
deformed,  who  has  little  money  and  a  repulsive  mother, 
all  of  which  is  not  very  attractive  to  the  young  man. 
The  marriage  agent  knows  how  to  excuse  each  individual 
fault,  except  the  inexcusable  hunchback,  which  he 
must  cope  with.  The  girl  apparently  has  many  faults 
which  can  be  overlooked,  but  one  from  which  you  cannot 
get  away,  and  which  is  apt  to  hinder  matrimony.  The 
agent  acts  as  if  he  had  removed  every  individual  fault  by 
his  excuses,  forgetting  that  each  leaves  behind  some 
depreciation  which  accumulates.     He  insists  upon  dealing 


freud's  theory  of  wit  345 

with  each  factor  individually,  and  refuses  to  connect  them 
into  a  whole  (sum).  The  entire  joke  shows  a  semblance  of 
logic  characteristic  of  sophism  which  serves  here  to 
conceal  the  false  logic. 

The  fallacy  or  sophism  in  (2)  and  (3)  may  be  designated 
as  automatic.  The  marriage  agent  reacts  a  number  of 
times,  one  after  another,  in  the  same  manner,  and  con- 
tinues in  the  same  manner  on  the  next  occasion  when  it 
becomes  unsuited  and  runs  contrary  to  his  intentions. 
Falling  into  the  automatism  of  habit,  he  fails  to  adapt 
himself  to  the  required  situation.  Thus  the  marriage 
agent  in  the  second  story  is  so  fascinated  by  the  failings 
and  infirmities  of  the  bride-to-be  that  he  completes  the 
list  from  his  own  knowledge,  which  it  was  neither  his 
business  nor  his  intention  to  do.  In  the  third  story  he  is 
so  carried  away  by  his  zeal  to  convince  the  young  man  of 
the  family's  wealth,  that  he  comes  out  with  something 
which  upsets  all  his  efforts.  In  both  examples  the  autom- 
atism triumphs  over  the  appropriate  variation  of 
thought  and  expression. 

The  examples  given  below  take  us  to  another  form  of 
the  technique  of  wit. 

1.  It  is  called  college  commencement  because  the 
students  then  commence  to  forget  what  they  have 
hitherto  learned. 

2.  If  the  play  is  good  and  the  star  is  rotten, 
The  author's  famous,  but  the  star  forgotten. 
If  the  star  is  good  and  the  play  is  rotten, 

The  author  gets  something,  the  star  gets  nothin' ! 

— Collier's  Irrational  Weakly. 


346  PSYCHANALYSIS 

The  second  example  may  recall  the  group  of  "manifold 
application  of  the  same  material,"  but  in  this  case  as  can 
be  readily  seen,  the  double  meaning  plays  no  part.  The 
important  factors  in  these  examples  depend  on  the 
formation  of  new  and  unexpected  identities,  and  on  the 
production  of  ideas  and  definitions  related  to  each  other 
and  to  a  common  third.  It  is  a  unification.  Unification 
is  also  a  basis  of  the  quick  repartee  in  wit,  for  ready 
repartee  consists  in  using  the  defense  for  aggression,  and 
in  "  turning  the  tables,"  or  "  in  paying  with  the  same  coin;" 
that  is,  the  repartee  consists  in  establishing  an  unexpected 
identity  between  the  attack  and  counter  attack.  This 
is  well  illustrated  in  the  following  examples. 

A  lawyer  of  small  stature  came  into  court  to  look  after 
his  client's  interests.  His  opponent,  not  knowing  him, 
asked  him  what  he  wanted,  and  on  being  told  who  he 
was,  jokingly  remarked,  "What?  Such  a  little  lawyer? 
Why  I  could  put  you  into  my  pocket!"  "You  could," 
tranquilly  responded  the  former,  "but  then  you  would 
have  more  brains  in  your  pocket  than  in  your  head." 

On  returning  to  Paris  after  crossing  Niagara  Falls, 
Blondin  was  the  hero  of  the  hour.  Alexander  Dumas, 
who  was  one  of  his  many  visitors,  permitted  himself  to 
doubt  the  feat,  upon  which  Blondin  angrily  exclaimed, 
"Well,  M.  Dumas,  if  you  like,  come  and  walk  with  me 
over  the  Falls."  "  With  pleasure,"  retorted  the  celebrated 
author,  "but  only  on  condition  that  I  be  allowed  to  carry 
you." 

The  excellent  repartee  in  the  last  anecdote  which  meets 
an  impossible  demand  with  just  as  impossible  a  condition, 
contains  another  technical  moment  which  would  be  absent 


freud's  theory  of  wit  347 

if  the  answer  had  been,  "  No,  I  fear  you  will  not  be  able 
to  carry  me."  To  illustrate  this  point  I  will  again  quote 
an  example  from  Freud. 

Frederick  the  Great  heard  of  a  clergyman  who  had  the 
reputation  of  communicating  with  spirits.  He  sent  for 
him  and  received  him  with  the  following  question,  "Can 
you  call  up  ghosts?"  The  answer  was,  "At  your  pleasure, 
your  Majesty,  but  they  won't  come."  Here  it  is  quite 
obvious  that  the  wit  lies  in  the  substitution  for  the  only 
answer  possible,  "No,"  its  opposite.  To  complete  this 
substitution,  "but"  had  to  be  added  to  "yes"  which  gives 
the  equivalent  for  "No." 

Such  representation  through  tlie  opposite  is  another  form 
of  technique  of  wit.  A  very  pure  example  of  this  form 
is  the  following: 

"This  woman  resembles  the  Venus  de  Milo  in  many 
points;  like  her  she  is  extraordinarily  old,  and  has  no 
teeth,  and  like  her  she  has  white  spots  on  the  yellow 
surface  of  her  body"  (Heine).  Heine  thus  depicts 
ugliness  by  making  it  agree  with  the  most  beautiful. 

The  following  anecdote  will  serve  as  another  illustration 
of  this  group.  The  great  orator,  Cicero,  once  remarked  to 
a  man  who  told  him  that  his  wife  was  thirty  years  old, 
"That  is  undoubtedly  true,  since  I  have  heard  it  for  the 
last  ten  years."  What  Cicero  really  meant  was,  "This 
cannot  be  true,  as  I  heard  you  say  the  same  thing  ten 
years  ago."  He  said  just  the  opposite  however,  "that  is 
undoubtedly  true,"  and  if  the  next  sentence  had  read, 
"for  I  have  heard  you  say  this  before,"  it  would  have 
merely  reinforced  the  first.  Instead  it  reads,  "For  I 
have  heard  you  say  this  for  the  last  ten  years;"  that  is, 


348  PSYCHANALYSIS 

he  carries  the  reinforcement  too  far  and  thus  indicated 
the  opposite  of  what  is  expressed  in  the  first  part.  Cicero 
thus  succeeds  in  making  himself  plain  by  saying  the 
opposite  of  what  he  thinks.  But  this  opposite  is  nothing 
but  a  very  striking  outdoing,  which  forms  another  group 
in  the  technique  of  wit. 

Mrs.  A.:  "Can  you  recommend  your  former  servant? 
Does  she  understand  everything  well?"  Mrs.  B.:  "Oh, 
yes,  she  understands  everything  even  better." 

This  is  a  very  simple  example  of  "outdoing"  wit.  In- 
stead of  saying,  "No,"  Mrs.  B.  says  "Yes,"  and  reinforces 
it  with  a  still  stronger  affirmative,  which,  however,  thus 
gives  the  equivalent  for  "No." 

Besides  the  technique  of  expression  through  the  oppo- 
site, wit  is  also  produced  by  expression  through  the  similar 
and  cognate,  or  rather  through  the  homogeneous  and  coher- 
ent.    The  following  story  illustrates  this  group. 

An  Irishman  who  was  expected  to  die  was  visited  at  the 
same  time  by  his  priest  and  physician.  After  they  had 
both  performed  their  functions  the  dying  man  turned  to 
the  doctor  and  asked,  "  Doctor,  how  much  will  you  charge 
my  wife  for  your  services  after  I'll  be  gone?"  The  doctor 
was  somewhat  reluctant  to  answer,  but  on  being  urged  he 
said,  "I  will  ask  her  for  $100."  Turning  to  the  priest  the 
Irishman  asked  the  same  question,  and  as  he  was  very 
insistent  the  priest  answered  that  he,  too,  would  charge 
$100  for  his  services.  The  Irishman  paused  for  awhile 
and  said,  "  Doctor,  will  you  please  take  hold  of  my  right 
arm,  and  Father,  will  you  please  take  hold  of  my  left  arm." 
When  they  complied  with  his  request  he  lay  back  and 
said,  "  Now,  I  can  die  like  the  Lord." 


freud's  theory  of  wit  349 

The  Irishman's  remark  is  quite  plain;  we  deal  with  a 
statement  which  could  not  be  directly  expressed.  The 
indirect  expression  in  this  story  was  produced  in  the 
following  manner.  The  remark,  "Now  I  can  die  like 
the  Lord,"  suggested  that  being  between  the  priest  and 
the  doctor  recalls  the  Saviour  dying  between  the  two 
thieves.  This  involves  the  suggestion  that  the  speaker, 
too,  is  between  two  thieves.  What  he  really  wished  to 
say  was,  "You  are  two  robbers  to  charge  my  wife  $100 
each."  This  thought  is  expressed  indirectly  by  means  of 
association  and  in  a  manner  designated  as  allusion.  This 
witticism  is  also  an  excellent  example  of  the  so-called 
grim  humor  (Galgenhumor). 

There  are  other  forms  of  the  technique  of  wit,  but  we 
have  described,  if  only  briefly,  the  most  common  and 
most  important  technical  means.  These  will  help  us 
to  judge  the  psychic  mechanism  and  indicate  the  way 
for  the  future  solutions  of  the  problem.  As  mentioned 
above,  the  interesting  process  of  condensation  with  sub- 
stitution, which  we  have  recognized  as  the  nucleus  of  the 
technique  of  the  wit  of  words,  evinces  the  same  mechanism 
in  the  formation  of  dreams.  The  technique  of  the  wit  of 
thoughts — such  as  displacement,  false  logic,  absurdity, 
indirect  representation,  and  expression  through  the 
opposite — all  these  are  found  also  in  the  technique  of 
dreams.  It  is  displacement  that  gives  the  dream  its 
strange  appearance  and  thus  prevents  us  from  recognizing 
in  the  dream  only  a  continuation  of  our  waking  thoughts. 
The  existence  of  the  nonsensical  and  absurd  in  the  dream 
is  the  reason  for  the  belief  that  there  is  a  deterioration  of 
the  psychic  activities  in  the  dream,  and  that  the  dream 


350  PSYCHANALYSIS 

shows  neither  reason  nor  logic.  The  popular  saying, 
"Dreams  go  by  contraries,"  shows  well  that  the  idea  of 
expression  through  the  opposite  is  well  known  even  to  the 
laity.  We  also  find  in  the  dream  indirect  expressions  and 
the  Other  mechanisms  found  in  wit.  All  of  this  shows 
the  close  resemblance  between  the  techniques  of  the  dream 
and  of  wit,  and  as  will  be  shown  later  this  resemblance 
is  not  at  all  accidental. 

THE  TENDENCIES  OF  WIT 

Following  the  reaction  it  produces,  we  divide  wit  into 
purposeful,  or  that  which  shows  definite  aims,  and  harm- 
less, or  that  which  shows  no  particular  aim.  It  is  only 
the  former  that  is  apt  to  be  met  with  resistances  from 
hearers  or  persons  concerned.  There  is  no  relation  what- 
soever between  these  classifications  and  those  mentioned 
above.  A  harmless  joke  may  be  produced  by  witty  words 
or  witty  thoughts,  and  any  of  the  techniques  described 
may  serve  to  produce  a  purposeful  witticism.  Following 
our  theoretical  explanation  of  the  nature  of  wit  we  may 
say  that  the  harmless  wit  is  for  our  purposes  of  greater 
value  than  the  purposeful,  and  that  the  shallow  wit  is  of 
greater  value  than  the  profound.  For  the  harmless  and 
shallow  play  upon  words  presents  to  us  the  problem  of  wit 
in  its  purest  forms,  without  danger  of  confusion  through 
the  introduction  of  the  tendency  factor  and  consequent 
false  judgment.  We  often  laugh  on  hearing  the  most 
ingenuous  and  harmless  joke  where  the  pleasure  experi- 
enced cannot  have  originated  from  the  idea  or  tendency 
of  the  joke;  we  have  then  to  conclude  that  the  pleasurable 
feeling  is  derived  from  the  technique  of  the  wit  alone. 


freud's  THEORY  OF  "WIT  351 

The  technical  means  of  wit,  such  as  condensation,  dis- 
placement, indirect  expression,  etc.,  have  the  power  of 
producing  in  the  hearer  a  feeling  of  pleasure.  We  cannot, 
however,  as  yet  see  how  they  come  to  possess  that  power. 
This  gives  us  a  new  axiom  for  the  explanation  of  wit,  and 
brings  out  more  sharply  what  has  been  shown  above, 
namely  that  the  character  of  wit  depends  on  the  mode  of 
expression.  For  it  will  be  recalled  that  whenever  it  was 
possible  to  reduce  the  wit  by  substituting  another  expres- 
sion, this  not  only  abrogated  the  character  of  the  wit, 
but  the  laughter-producing  effect,  that  is,  the  pleasure 
of  the  wit.  The  pleasurable  effect  of  the  harmless  wit  is 
usually  moderate;  all  that  the  hearer  can  expect  to  obtain 
from  it  is  a  sense  of  satisfaction  and  a  passing  smile;  and 
even  this  is  partially  due  to  the  idea.  The  sudden 
irresistible  outburst  of  laughter  that  follows  the  tendency 
wit  rarely  follows  the  purposeless  wit.  As  the  technique 
is  the  same  in  both  it  may  be  assumed  that  by  virtue  of 
its  tendencies  the  tendency  wit  has  at  its  disposal  sources 
of  pleasure  to  which  the  harmless  wit  has  no  access. 

Wherever  wit  is  not  harmless  it  serves  two  tendencies: 
it  is  either  a  hostile  joke  serving  as  aggression,  satire, 
or  defense,  or  it  is  an  obscene  joke  serving  as  an  exhibition. 

To  examine  the  way  in  which  wit  serves  these  tendencies 
we  will  first  discuss  the  obscene  or  "smutty"  joke.  By 
a  " smutty"  joke  we  understand  the  bringing  into  promi- 
nence of  sexual  facts  or  relations  through  speech.  How- 
ever, a  lecture  on  the  anatomy  of  the  sexual  organs  or  on 
the  physiology  of  reproduction  need  not  necessarily  have 
anything  in  common  with  the  smutty  joke.  The  smutty 
joke  must  fulfil  the  following  condition.     It  must  be  di- 


352  PSYCHANALYSIS 

rected  toward  a  certain  person  who  excites  one  sexually, 
and  who  becomes  cognizant  of  the  speaker's  excitement  by 
listening  to  the  smutty  joke,  and  thereby  in  turn  becomes 
sexually  excited.  Instead  of  becoming  sexually  excited 
the  listener  may  react  with  shame  and  embarrassment, 
which,  however,  only  shows  a  reaction  against  the  excite- 
ment and  thus  signifies  an  admission  of  the  same.  The 
smutty  joke  was  originally  directed  against  the  woman, 
and  is  comparable  to  an  attempt  at  seduction.  If  a  man 
tells  or  listens  to  smutty  jokes  in  male  society  it  is  because 
the  original  situation  cannot  be  realized  on  account  of  social 
inhibitions.  The  smutty  joke  is  an  exhibition  directed 
against  a  person  to  whom  one  is  not  sexually  indifferent. 
Through  the  utterance  of  obscene  words  the  person  attacked 
is  incited  to  picture  the  parts  of  the  body  in  question,  and 
is  shown  that  the  aggressor  pictures  the  same  thing. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  the  original  motive  of  the  smutty  j  oke 
was  the  pleasure  of  seeing  the  sexual  displayed.  As  shown 
in  the  "Three  Contributions  to  the  Sexual  Theories,"13 
one  of  the  primitive  components  of  our  libido  is  the  desire 
to  see  the  sexual  exposed.  It  is  probably  only  a  substitu- 
tion for  the  desire  to  touch  the  sexual,  which  is  assumed 
to  be  the  primary  pleasure.  The  libido  for  looking  and 
touching  is  found  in  every  person  in  two  forms,  active  and 
passive,  or  masculine  and  feminine;  and  in  accordance  with 
the  preponderance  of  the  sex  characteristics  it  develops 
preponderately  in  one  or  the  other  direction.  At  least  a 
certain  amount  of  touching  is  indispensable  in  order  to 
attain  the  normal  sexual  aim.  We  all  know  that  touch- 
ing the  skin  of  the  sexual  object  causes  pleasure  and  excite- 
ment.    The  same  holds  true  of  looking,  which  is  analogous 


freud's  theory  of  wit  353 

to  touching.  Sexual  excitement  is  frequently  awakened 
by  optical  impressions,  and  selection  taking  account  of 
this  fact  makes  the  sexual  object  a  thing  of  beauty.  The 
covering  of  the  body,  which  is  introduced  by  civilization, 
serves  to  arouse  sexual  curiosity,  and  constantly  strives  to 
supplement  the  sexual  object  by  uncovering  the  hidden 
parts.  This  may  be  turned  into  the  artistic  ("sublima- 
tion") if  the  interest  be  turned  from  the  genitals  to  the 
form  of  the  body.  The  tendency  to  linger  at  the  inter- 
mediary sexual  aim  by  looking  is  found  in  most  normals. 
It  in  a  way  gives  them  the  capability  of  directing  a  certain 
amount  of  their  libido  to  a  higher  artistic  aim.  But  this 
fondness  for  looking  may  become  overestimated  and  fixed, 
and  then  becomes  a  perversion.  We  then  have  the  so- 
called  voyeurs  or  "peepers."  The  desire  to  exhibit  is 
readily  observed  in  children,  and  where  this  desire  does  not 
experience  the  sexual  repression  it  develops  into  a  desire 
for  exhibition,  a  common  perversion  in  grown-up  men.  In 
women  the  passive  desire  to  exhibit  is  almost  regularly 
covered  by  the  marked  reaction  of  sexual  modesty;  de- 
spite this,  however,  remnants  of  the  desire  may  also  be 
seen  in  women's  dress. 

In  a  man  a  great  part  of  this  striving  to  exhibit  remains 
as  a  part  of  the  libido,  and  serves  to  initiate  the  sexual  act. 
If  the  striving  asserts  itself  on  first  meeting  the  woman  it 
manifests  itself  in  speech,  through  which  the  man  makes 
himself  known  to  woman.  By  having  aroused  in  her 
pictures,  the  woman  herself  merges  into  a  corresponding 
excitement,  and  is  thus  forced  to  passive  exhibition. 
The  speech  of  courtship  is  not  regularly  the  smutty  joke, 
but  may  pass  over  into  one.     If  the  woman  is  yielding 

23 


354  PSYCHANALYSIS 

there  is  no  need  for  the  smutty  wit;  it  is  only  resorted  to 
when  she  is  resistive  and  on  the  defense.  As  the  sexual 
aggression  is  inhibited  in  its  progress  toward  the  act,  the 
sexually  inciting  speech  changes  into  the  smutty  wit;  and 
the  aggressor,  lingering  at  the  evocation  of  the  excitement, 
takes  pleasure  in  the  effects  his  speech  produces  in  the 
woman.  The  unyieldingness  of  the  woman  is  therefore 
another  condition  for  the  determination  of  the  smutty 
wit.  The  ideal  case  for  such  resistance  on  the  part  of  the 
woman  usually  results  from  the  presence  of  another  man 
whose  presence  excludes  the  immediate  yielding  of  the 
woman. 

The  tendency  joke  usually  requires  three  persons — 
the  first  person  who  makes  the  wit,  the  second  person 
who  is  taken  as  the  object  of  the  hostile  or  sexual  aggres- 
sion, and  the  third  person  in  whom  the  purpose  of  the 
wit  to  produce  pleasure  is  fulfilled.  The  process  may  be 
described  as  follows:  As  soon  as  the  libidinous  impulse 
of  the  first  person  meets  with  resistances  to  his  gratifica- 
tion through  the  woman,  he  immediately  develops  a 
hostile  attitude  toward  this  second  person  and  takes  the 
originally  intruding  third  person  as  his  confederate. 
Through  the  obscene  speech  of  the  first  person  the  woman 
is  exposed  before  the  third  person,  who  as  a  listener  is 
fascinated  by  the  easy  gratification  of  his  own  libido. 
We  can  now  understand  what  wit  performs  by  its  tend- 
ency. It  makes  possible  the  gratification  of  a  craving 
(lewd  or  hostile)  despite  the  hindrance  which  stands  in 
the  way;  it  eludes  the  hindrance  and  draws  pleasure  from 
a  pleasure  source  which  has  become  inaccessible  through 
the  hindrance.     The  hindrance  in  the  way  is  usually 


freud's  theory  of  wit  355 

nothing  but  the  higher  degree  of  social  cultivation  which 
correspondingly  increases  the  inability  of  the  woman  to 
tolerate  the  bare  sexual.  The  power  which  renders  it 
difficult  or  impossible  for  the  woman,  and  in  a  lesser 
degree  for  the  man,  to  enjoy  unveiled  obscenities  we  call 
"repression."  It  is  the  same  psychic  process  which 
keeps  from  consciousness  whole  complexes  of  emotions 
and  ideas,  and  has  shown  itself  to  be  the  principal  factor 
in  the  causation  of  the  psychoneuroses.  Civilization 
and  the  higher  education  have  helped  in  the  development 
of  this  repression,  and  have  produced  many  changes  in 
our  psychic  organization.  What  was  once  perceived  as 
pleasurable  now  appears  as  inacceptable,  and  is  rejected 
by  all  the  psychic  forces.  Owing  to  the  repression  brought 
about  by  civilization  many  primary  pleasures  are  now 
disapproved  by  the  censor  and  lost.  But  the  human 
psyche  finds  renunciation  difficult,  and  hence  we  find 
that  tendency  wit  gives  us  the  means  to  make  the  renun- 
ciation retrogressive,  and  thus  regains  what  has  been  lost. 
When  we  laugh  over  a  delicate  obscene  witticism  we 
laugh  at  the  same  thing  which  causes  laughter  in  the 
ill-bred  man  when  he  hears  a  coarse,  obscene  joke.  The 
pleasure  in  both  cases  comes  from  the  same  source.  The 
coarse,  obscene  joke  could  not,  however,  incite  us  to 
laughter,  because  it  would  cause  us  shame  or  appear  to 
us  disgusting;  we  can  laugh  only  when  wit  comes  to  our 
aid.14 

We  have  now  demonstrated  what  was  said  at  the  out- 
set, namely,  that  the  tendency  wit  has  access  to  other 
sources  of  pleasure  than  the  harmless  wit,  in  which  all 
pleasure  depends  on  the  technique.     We  are,  however, 


356  PSYCHANALYSIS 

in  no  position  to  distinguish  in  the  tendency  wit  what 
part  of  the  pleasure  originates  from  the  technique  and 
what  part  from  the  tendency.  Strictly  speaking,  we  do 
not  know  over  what  we  are  laughing. 

When  we  examine  the  role  of  wit  in  the  service  of  the 
hostile  tendency  we  at  once  meet  with  similar  conditions. 
Since  our  individual  childhood  and  the  childhood  of 
human  civilization  our  hostile  impulses  toward  our  fellow 
beings,  like  our  sexual  strivings,  have  been  subjected 
to  restrictions  and  repressions.  Even  to-day  we  are 
not  yet  ready  to  love  our  enemies  and  to  extend  to  them 
our  left  cheek  after  we  are  smitten  on  the  right.  Never- 
theless, we  have  made  some  progress  in  controlling  our 
hostile  feelings.  Higher  civilization  and  culture  trains 
us  to  suppress  the  hostile  disposition;  we  are  taught 
that  it  is  undignified  to  use  insulting  language,  and  even 
the  means  of  combat  have  been  markedly  restricted. 
Society  as  the  third  person  in  the  combat,  for  the  protec- 
tion of  its  own  interest,  prevents  us  from  expressing  our 
hostile  feelings  in  action;  and  hence,  as  in  the  sexual 
aggression,  there  has  developed  a  new  technique  of  invec- 
tive, the  aim  of  which  is  to  enlist  the  third  person  against 
our  enemy.  By  belittling  and  humbling  our  enemy, 
by  scorning  and  ridiculing  him,  we  indirectly  obtain  the 
pleasure  of  his  defeat  through  the  laughter  of  the  third 
person,  the  passive  spectator. 

The  wit  of  hostile  aggression  gives  us  the  means  to 
make  our  enemy  ridiculous,  which,  on  account  of  the 
existing  hindrances,  could  not  be  effected  in  any  other 
way;  in  other  words,  wit  affords  us  the  means  of  sur- 
mounting the  restrictions  and  of  opening  the  otherwise 


freud's  theory  of  wit  357 

inaccessible  pleasure  sources.  Because  of  the  gain  in 
pleasure  it  fascinates  the  hearer  to  take  our  part,  even  if 
he  is  not  convinced — just  as  we  are  wont  to  overestimate 
the  substance  of  witty  remarks  when  we  are  fascinated 
by  their  technique.  By  way  of  illustration  the  following 
example  may  be  cited :  Wendell  Phillips,  according  to  the 
recent  biography  by  Dr.  Lorenzo  Sears,  was,  on  one 
occasion,  lecturing  in  Ohio,  and  while  on  a  railroad  journey 
going  to  keep  one  of  his  appointments,  he  met  in  the  car 
a  number  of  clergymen  returning  from  some  sort  of 
convention.  One  of  the  ministers  felt  called  upon  to 
approach  Mr.  Phillips,  and  asked  him,  "Are  you  Mr. 
Phillips?"  "I  am,  sir."  "Are  you  trying  to  free  the 
niggers?"  "Yes,  sir;  I  am  an  abolitionist."  "Well, 
why  do  you  preach  your  doctrines  up  here?  Why  don't 
you  go  over  into  Kentucky?"  "Excuse  me,  are  you  a 
preacher?"  "I  am,  sir."  "Are  you  trying  to  save 
souls  from  hell?"  "Yes,  sir,  that's  my  business."  "Well, 
why  don't  you  go  there?"  The  assailant  hurried  into 
the  smoker  amid  a  roar  of  unsanctified  laughter.  This 
anecdote  nicely  illustrates  the  tendency  wit  in  the  service 
of  hostile  aggression.  The  minister's  behavior  was 
offensive  and  irritating,  yet  Wendell  Phillips  as  a  man  of 
culture  could  not  defend  himself  in  the  same  manner  as 
a  common  ill-bred  person  would  have  done,  and  as  his 
inner  feelings  must  have  prompted  him  to  do.  The 
only  alternative  under  the  circumstances  would  have 
been  to  take  the  affront  in  silence,  had  not  wit  showed 
him  the  way,  and  enabled  him  by  the  technical  means 
of  unification  to  turn  the  tables  on  his  assailant.  He 
not  only  belittled  him  and  turned  him  into  ridicule,  but 


358  PSYCIIANALYSIS 


ti 


by  his  clever  retort,  "Well,  why  don't  you  go  there? 
fascinated  the  other  clergymen,  and  thus  brought  them 
to  his  side.  The  anecdote  of  the  two  lawyers  mentioned 
above  shows  the  same  mechanism. 

We  have  now  shown  that  the  pleasure  found  in  wit 
is  produced  on  the  one  hand  by  the  technique,  and  on  the 
other  hand  by  the  tendency.  We  will  next  endeavor  to 
discover  the  common  source  uniting  the  two. 

THE  PLEASURE  MECHANISM  AND  PSYCHOGENESIS  OF  WIT 

In  endeavoring  to  discover  how  the  pleasure  results 
from  the  technique  and  the  tendency  of  wit,  and  the 
mechanism  of  this  resulting  pleasure,  we  find  that  the 
explanation  sought  for  can  be  more  readily  discovered  in 
the  tendency  than  in  the  harmless  wit.  That  the  plea- 
sure in  the  tendency  wit  results  from  the  gratification 
of  a  tendency,  which  gratification  would  not  otherwise 
take  place,  is  quite  obvious.  But  the  manner  in  which 
wit  produces  this  gratification  depends  on  special  deter- 
minants. There  are  two  different  cases  to  be  considered. 
The  simpler  of  the  two  is  the  case  in  which  an  outer  hindrance 
stands  in  the  way  of  the  gratification  of  the  tendency.  This 
may  be  illustrated  by  the  following  example:  "How  many 
members  are  there  in  your  council  of  ten?"  Louis  XIV 
once  sarcastically  asked  the  ambassador  of  the  republic  of 
Venice.  "Forty,  your  Majesty,"  retorted  the  polite  Italian. 
The  wit  in  this  case  serves  to  return  one  affront  for  another. 
The  ambassador  could  not  answer  as  he  would  have  liked, 
because  Louis  XIV  could  not  be  insulted,  so  he  skilfully 
made  use  of  the  unification  wit,  and  thus  paid  him  in  his  own 
coin. 


FREUDS'  THEORY  OF  WIT  359 

The  second  class  comprises  cases  in  which  internal 
hindrances  stand  in  the  way  of  the  direct  realization  of 
the  tendency.  As  examples  we  may  cite  the  answer  of 
the  lawyer  to  his  opponent,  and  Wendell  Phillips's  answer 
to  the  clergyman.  Wendell  Phillips  was  prevented  from 
using  invectives  by  a  highly  developed  esthetic  sense, 
but  wit  helped  to  overcome  the  inner  resistances  and  to 
remove  the  inhibitions.  The  gratification  of  the  tend- 
ency is  made  possible,  and  in  this  way  the  suppression 
and  the  "psychic  damming"  connected  with  it  is  evaded. 
The  mechanism  of  the  development  of  pleasure  is  the 
same  in  both  cases.  The  only  difference  between  the 
cases  of  outer  and  inner  hindrances  consists  in  the  fact 
that  in  the  one  an  already  existing  inhibition  is  removed, 
while  in  the  other  the  formation  of  a  new  inhibition  is 
evaded.  We  may  add  that  the  formation  as  well  as  the 
retention  of  a  psychic  inhibition  necessitates  a  "psychic 
expenditure."  If  pleasure  is  obtained  in  the  employ- 
ment of  both  kinds  of  the  tendency  wit,  it  may  be 
readily  assumed  that  such  resultant  pleasure  corresponds  to 
the  economy  of  -psychic  expenditure. 

Again  we  are  confronted  with  the  principle  of  economy 
first  noticed  in  the  technique  of  the  wit  of  words;  but 
whereas  the  economy  was  there  confined  to  the  use  of 
few  or  possibly  the  same  words,  it  seems  here  to  comprise 
the  economy  of  psychic  expenditure  in  general.  The 
secret  of  the  pleasure  secured  through  tendency  wit  seems 
to  be  in  the  economy  of  the  expenditure  of  inhibition  or 
suppression.  We  shall  now  turn  to  the  mechanism  of 
the  pleasure  of  the  harmless  wit. 

In  examining  appropriate  examples  of  harmless  wit  we 


360  PSYCHANALYSIS 

concluded  that  the  source  of  pleasure  lies  solely  in  the  tech- 
nique of  the  wit.  Let  us  now  see  whether  this  pleasure 
can  be  traced  to  an  economy  of  psychic  expenditure. 

The  technique  of  one  group  of  this  wit,  the  play  upon 
words,  consisted  in  directing  the  psychic  focus  on  the 
sound  instead  of  on  the  sense  of  the  word,  which  greatly 
facilitated  the  psychic  labor.  It  is  known  that  in  ab- 
normal mental  states  where  the  possibility  of  concen- 
trating psychic  expenditure  on  one  place  is  reduced,  the 
word  sounds  are  more  prominent  than  their  significance, 
and  that  such  patients  react  with  "outer"  instead  of 
"inner"  associations.15  Children  who  still  treat  the  word 
as  an  object,  show  a  tendency  to  seek  the  same  sense  under 
the  same  or  similar  wording.  This  provides  no  small 
amount  of  amusement  for  grown-ups.  If  wit  gives  us 
pleasure  by  employing  the  same  or  similar  words  in  order 
to  reach  from  one  idea  to  another,  we  can  justly  say  that 
this  pleasure  is  due  to  the  economy  of  psychic  expenditure. 

A  second  group  of  technical  means  of  wit — unification, 
accordance,  allusions  and  citations — all  these  evince  one 
common  character;  namely,  one  always  discovers  some- 
thing familiar  when  one  expects  instead  something  new. 
To  discover  the  familiar  is  pleasurable.  It  is  not  difficult 
to  recognize  such  pleasure  as  one  of  economy  and  to  refer 
it  to  the  economy  of  psychic  expenditure.  That  recogni- 
tion of  the  familiar  causes  pleasure  is  universally  admitted. 
We  know  also  that  the  source  of  pleasure  in  rhyme, 
alliteration,  refrain,  and  other  forms  of  repetition  of 
similar  sounding  words  in  poetry,  is  due  merely  to  the 
discovery  of  the  familiar. 

It  may  be  thought  at  first  sight  that  the  third  group  in 


freud's  theory  of  wit  361 

the  technique,  viz.,  wit  of  thought,  which  includes  dis- 
placement, false  logic,  absurdity,  representation  through 
the  opposite,  etc.,  bears  no  relation  to  the  technique  of 
discovering  the  familiar,  but  it  will  not  be  difficult  to 
demonstrate  that  this  group,  too,  shows  an  economy  or 
facilitation  of  psychic  expenditure.  It  is  quite  obvious 
that  it  is  easier  to  turn  away  from  a  definite  trend  of 
thought  than  to  stick  to  it;  it  is  easier  to  mix  up  different 
things  than  to  distinguish  them;  and  it  is  particularly 
easier  to  pass  over  illogical  conclusions.  Moreover,  in 
connecting  words  or  thoughts  it  is  especially  easy  to 
overlook  the  fact  that  such  connections  should  result  in 
sense.  These  mechanisms  are  well  known  and  are  those 
especially  used  in  the  techniques  of  the  wit  mentioned 
above.  It  will  sound  strange,  however,  to  assert  that 
such  processes  in  the  work  of  wit  may  produce  pleasure. 

Though  "pleasure  and  nonsense"  is  almost  absent  in 
our  serious  existence  it  can  still  be  demonstrated  in  two 
cases.  It  is  visible  in  the  learning  child,  and  in  the  adult 
under  toxic  influences.  When  the  child  learns  to  have 
command  over  its  mother  tongue  it  takes  pleasure  in 
playing  with  words.  It  disregards  the  meaning  of  the 
words  and  connects  them  in  order  to  obtain  pleasure 
through  rhythm  and  rhyme.  An  excellent  example  of 
this  is  the  familiar  "Mother  Goose."  As  the  child 
becomes  older  it  is  forced  to  abandon  this  pleasure  and 
to  employ  the  words  in  their  senseful  meaning.  But 
even  later  in  life  there  is  a  tendency  to  overstep  the 
restrictions  in  the  use  of  words,  and  adults  often  change 
words  by  adding  suffixes  and  prefixes  and  reduplications. 
This  is  especially  seen  in  the  neologisms  of  the  insane.16 


362  PSYCHANALYSIS 

The  child  makes  use  of  play  in  order  to  withdraw  from 
the  pressure  of  critical  reason  which  is  imposed  upon  it  in 
the  course  of  development.  The  restrictions  appear 
still  greater  when  in  the  education  of  right  thinking  it 
becomes  necessary  to  separate  reality  from  fiction.  As 
a  persistent  resistance  against  these  restrictions  we  may 
mention  the  formation  of  fancies.  The  force  of  reason 
becomes  so  strong  in  later  childhood  and  puberty  that  the 
child  then  rarely  dares  to  utter  nonsense.  But  men  are 
untiring  pleasure  seekers,  and  find  it  extremely  difficult 
to  renounce  pleasure  once  experienced.  The  tendency 
to  skylarking  in  students  is  nothing  but  a  demonstration 
against  the  tyranny  of  forced  study  and  reality,  which 
they  tolerate  only  impatiently.  No  one  can  fail  to  recog- 
nize in  our  college  cries  and  songs  the  nonsensical  and 
infantile  play  with  words.  These  feelings  are  especially 
enhanced  by  alcoholic  indulgence  under  which  influence 
the  grown  up  again  becomes  a  child.  He  derives  pleas- 
ure from  a  free  disposal  of  his  mental  stream  which  is 
now  unencumbered  by  the  restraint  of  logic. 

In  reviewing  the  three  groups  of  the  technique  of  wit 
it  has  been  shown  that  the  technique  of  the  absurd 
corresponds  to  a  source  of  pleasure;  and  that  this  pleasure 
is  produced  by  the  economy  of  psychic  expenditure,  and 
by  the  relief  from  the  restraint  of  reason.  When  we 
traced  the  psychogenesis  of  wit  we  found  that  the  first  step 
in  wit  is  play.  The  child  plays  when  it  learns  to  use 
words  and  connect  thoughts,  and  this  playing  is  probably 
the  result  of  an  impulse  which  urges  the  child  to  exercise 
its  capacities  (Groos).  Through  the  repetition  of  simi- 
larities,  the   rediscovering   of   the  familiar,    and   sound 


freud's  theory  of  wit  363 

associations,  it  obtains  pleasure  which  may  be  explained 
as  an  unexpected  economy  of  psychic  expenditure.  But 
this  playing  is  later  brought  to  an  end  by  reason  which 
rejects  it  as  senseless  or  absurd.  It  is  only  accidentally 
that  the  grown  up  finds  pleasure  in  the  rediscovering  of 
the  familiar.  This  only  occurs  when  he  is  in  a  playful 
mood,  which,  as  in  the  child,  removes  the  critical  inhibi- 
tions. But  as  men  do  not  like  to  wait  for  these  propitious 
occasions,  and  also  hate  to  forego  this  pleasure,  they  seek 
means  to  make  themselves  independent  of  these  pleasant 
states.  This  effort  to  evade  reason  and  find  a  substitute 
for  the  pleasant  mood  produces  the  second  element  of 
wit,  the  jest. 

The  object  of  the  jest  is  to  bring  about  the  resultant 
pleasure  of  playing,  and  at  the  same  time  appease  the 
protesting  reason  which  strives  to  suppress  the  pleasant 
feeling.  The  only  way  to  accomplish  this  is  to  give 
sense  and  meaning  to  the  senseless  and  absurd  combina- 
tion of  words  or  thoughts.  The  whole  process  of  wit 
production  is  therefore  directed  toward  the  discovery  of 
word  and  thought  constellations  which  fulfil  these  con- 
ditions. The  jest  makes  use  of  almost  all  the  technical 
means  of  wit.  The  most  conspicuous  factor  of  the  jest 
is  the  gratification  it  affords  by  making  possible  that 
which  reason  forbids.  Its  object  is  to  remove  inner 
inhibitions  and  thereby  to  render  productive  those  pleas- 
ure sources  which  have  become  inaccessible. 

If  we  follow  the  development  of  the  jest  until  it  reaches 
its  height  in  the  tendency  wit  we  find  that  the  jest's 
effort  is  to  produce  pleasure  and  that  it  is  content  when 
its   utterance   does   not   appear   perfectly   senseless   or 


364  PSYCHANALYSIS 

insipid.  If  this  utterance  is  substantial  and  valuable 
it  changes  into  wit.  When  we  hear  a  good  witticism  we 
experience  a  general  feeling  of  satisfaction  without  being 
able  to  tell  at  once  what  part  of  the  pleasure  comes  from 
the  witty  form,  and  what  part  from  the  excellent  thought. 
We  really  do  not  know  what  gives  us  the  pleasure  and  at 
what  we  are  laughing.  This  uncertainty  of  our  judgment 
may  have  given  the  motive  for  the  formation  of  the  wit 
in  the  literal  sense.  The  thought  seeks  the  disguise  of 
wit,  because  through  the  wit  it  recommends  itself  to  our 
attention  and  can  appear  to  us  more  important  and  valu- 
able than  it  is,  but  above  all  because  this  disguise  fascin- 
ates and  confuses  our  reason.  We  are  apt  to  attribute 
to  the  thought  the  pleasure  derived  from  the  witty  form, 
and  we  are  not  inclined  to  consider  improper  what  gives 
us  pleasure,  and  in  this  way  to  close  up  a  source  of  pleasure. 
For  if  wit  makes  us  laugh  it  is  because  it  establishes  in 
us  a  disposition  unfavorable  to  reason  and  conducive  to 
play.  To  accomplish  this  the  wit  had  to  exert  all  its 
effort.  Although  such  wit  is  harmless,  and  not  purpose- 
ful, we  can  assume  that  strictly  speaking  the  jest  alone 
shows  no  tendency,  that  is,  it  serves  to  produce  pleasure 
only.  Wit,  on  the  other  hand,  is  never  purposeless,  as 
the  great  tendencies  and  impulses  of  our  psychic  life  use 
it  for  their  purposes.  We  have  shown  above  the  part 
played  by  wit  in  satisfying  the  hostile  and  obscene  im- 
pulses; the  hostile  wit  changes  the  original  indifferent 
hearers  into  haters  and  scorners,  and  thus  confronts  the 
enemy  with  an  army  of  opponents  where  there  was  for- 
merly but  one.  The  obscene  wit  makes  a  confederate 
of  the  third  person,  who  originally  disturbed  the  sexual 


fkeud's  theory  of  wit  365 

situation,  by  giving  him  pleasure  through  the  utterance 
which  causes  the  woman  to  be  ashamed  in  his  presence. 
In  the  first  case  wit  overthrows  the  critical  judgment 
which  would  have  otherwise  examined  the  dispute  in 
question,  while  in  the  second  case  it  overcomes  the  inhibi- 
tions of  shame  and  decorum  by  the  pleasure  premium 
which  it  offers. 

What  impressed  us  most  on  first  reviewing  the  processes 
of  the  tendency  wit  was  the  effect  it  produced  on  the 
hearer.  It  is  more  important,  however,  to  understand 
the  effect  produced  by  wit  on  the  psychic  life  of  the 
person  who  makes  it,  or,  to  be  more  precise,  in  the  person 
who  conceives  it. 

In  regard  to  its  distribution  we  may  study  the  psychic 
processes  of  wit  in  reference  to  two  persons,  the  wit  pro- 
ducer and  the  hearer.  We  can  at  present  assume  that 
the  psychic  process  aroused  by  wit  in  the  hearer  is  usually 
an  imitation  of  the  psychic  processes  of  the  wit  producer. 
The  outer  inhibitions  which  are  overcome  in  the  hearer 
correspond  to  the  inner  inhibitions  of  the  wit  producer- 
Of  the  different  forms  of  the  inner  inhibitions  one  espe- 
cially merits  consideration.  We  designate  that  form  by 
the  name  of  "repression,"  and  it  is  characterized  by  the 
fact  that  it  excludes  from  consciousness  certain  former 
emotions  and  their  products.  Tendency  wit  is  capable 
of  liberating  pleasure  from  sources  which  have  under- 
gone repression.  If  the  overcoming  of  outer  hindrances 
can  be  traced  to  inner  inhibitions  and  repressions  we 
may  say  that  the  tendency  wit  proves  more  clearly  than 
any  other  developmental  stage  of  wit  that  the  main 
character  of  wit-making  is  to  set  free  pleasure  by  removing 


3G6  PSYCHANALYSIS 

inhibitions.  The  tendency  wit  reinforces  the  tendencies  which 
it  serves  by  bringing  to  them  assistance  from  repressed 
emotions  or  it  serves  the  repressed  tendencies  directly. 
Although  we  may  readily  assert  that  these  are  the  func- 
tions of  the  tendency  wit,  we  must  also  admit  that  we  can- 
not understand  in  what  manner  these  actions  can  succeed. 
This  is  a  rather  complicated  process,  which  we  will  attempt 
to  demonstrate  synthetically. 

According  to  G.  Th.  Fechner,  a  meeting  of  pleasurable 
conditions  will  produce  a  resultant  pleasure  greater  than 
the  sum  of  the  pleasure  values  of  the  separate  conditions. 
The  result  is  greater  than  the  sum  total  of  the  single 
effects.  The  theme  of  wit  does  not  give  us  the  oppor- 
tunity to  test  the  correctness  of  this  principle.  But 
from  wit  we  have  learned  something  else  which  at  least 
comes  near  this  principle.  We  have  shown  above  that 
in  a  cooperatoin  of  many  pleasure-producing  factors  we 
are  in  no  position  to  assign  to  each  one  the  resultant  part 
which  really  belongs  to  it.  But  the  situation  assumed 
in  the  principle  of  assistance  can  be  varied,  and  for 
these  new  conditions  we  can  formulate  the  following 
questions  and  answers:  What  happens  if  in  one  constel- 
lation there  is  a  meeting  of  pleasurable  and  painful  condi- 
tions? Upon  what  does  the  result  depend  and  can  we  have 
any  previous  indications  of  it?  The  tendency  wit  particu- 
larly shows  these  possibilities.  There  is  one  tendency  which 
strives  to  liberate  pleasure  from  a  certain  source,  while 
there  is  another  which  works  against  this  pleasurable 
development,  that  is,  which  inhibits  or  suppresses  it. 
The  suppressing  stream,  as  the  result  shows,  must  be 
somewhat    stronger    than    the    one    suppressed,    and    is 


freud's  theory  of  wit  367 

therefore  not  abolished.  But  now  there  appears  a 
second  tendency  which  would  strive  to  set  free  pleasure 
by  the  same  process  though  from  a  different  source;  it  thus 
acts  like  the  suppressed  one.  What  can  be  the  result? 
This  will  be  better  illustrated  by  an  example.  There  is  a 
tendency  to  insult  a  certain  person,  but  against  this 
there  is  a  feeling  of  decorum  and  esthetic  culture.  If  by 
virtue  of  some  emotional  state  the  insult  should  happen 
to  break  through  it  would  subsequently  be  painfully 
perceived.  The  insult  is  therefore  omitted.  There  is  a 
possibility,  however,  of  making  good  wit  from  the  words 
or  thoughts  which  would  have  served  in  the  insult,  that  is, 
pleasure  can  be  set  free  from  other  sources  without  being 
hindered  by  the  same  suppression.  But  the  second 
development  of  pleasure  would  have  to  be  omitted  if  the 
insulting  were  not  admitted,  and  as  the  latter  is  admitted 
it  is  connected  with  the  new  liberation  of  pleasure.  Ex- 
perience with  tendency  wit  shows  that  under  such  circum- 
stances the  suppressed  tendency  can  become  so  strength- 
ened by  the  help  of  wit  pleasure  as  to  overcome  the 
otherwise  stronger  inhibition.  But  the  satisfaction  thus 
obtained  is  not  produced  by  the  wit  alone;  it  is  incom- 
parably greater,  in  fact  it  is  by  so  much  greater  than 
the  pleasure  of  the  wit  that  we  must  assume  that  the 
former  suppressed  tendency  has  succeeded  in  breaking 
through,  perhaps  without  an  outlet.  Under  these  con- 
ditions the  tendency  wit  causes  the  most  prolific  laughter. 
Hence  we  see  that  the  case  of  the  tendency  wit  is  a  special 
case  of  the  principle  of  assistance.  A  possibility  of  the  de- 
velopment of  pleasure  enters  into  a  situation  in  which  another 
possibility  of  pleasure  is  hindered,  so  that  this  alone  would  not 


368  PSYCHANALYSIS 

result  in  pleasure.  The  result  is  a  development  of  pleas- 
ure which  is  greater  by  far  than  the  entering  possibility. 
The  latter  acted,  as  it  were,  as  an  alluring  premium, 
and  with  the  aid  of  a  small  sum  of  pleasure  a  very  large 
sum  is  obtained.  The  pleasure  serving  to  liberate  the 
large  sum  of  pleasure  is  designated  as  fore-pleasure 
(Vorlust),  and  the  principle  is  designated  as  the  principle 
of  fore-pleasure. 

The  effect  of  the  tendency  wit  can  be  formulated  as 
follows:  It  enters  into  the  service  of  tendencies  in  order 
to  produce  new  pleasure  by  removing  suppressions  and 
repressions.  This  it  does  by  means  of  the  wit  pleasure 
as  fore-pleasure.  When  we  review  its  development  we 
find  that  it  begins  as  play  in  order  to  produce  pleasure 
from  the  free  use  of  words  and  thoughts.  When  the 
growing  reason  forbids  this  senseless  play  with  words 
and  thoughts  it  turns  to  the  jest  or  joke  in  order  to  hold 
on  to  these  pleasure  sources,  and  in  order  to  be  able  to 
gain  new  pleasure  from  the  liberation  of  the  absurd. 
As  harmless  wit  it  assists  thoughts  and  enforces  them 
against  the  assault  of  critical  judgment.  In  this  it  makes 
use  of  the  principle  of  confounding  the  pleasure  sources. 
It  finally  enters  into  the  struggling  suppressed  tendencies 
in  order  to  remove  inner  inhibitions  in  accordance  with  the 
principle  of  fore-pleasure.  It  combats  in  turn  the  reason — 
the  critical  judgment — and  the  repression.  It  firmly 
adheres  to  the  original  word  pleasure  sources,  and  opens  new 
pleasure  sources  by  removing  inhibitions.  The  pleasure 
which  it  produces,  be  it  play-pleasure  or  removal-pleasure, 
can  at  all  times  be  traced  to  the  economy  of  psychic  ex- 
penditure. 


freud's  theory  of  wit  369 

THE  MOTIVES  OF  WIT  AND  WIT  AS  A  SOCIAL  PROCESS 

Although  the  desire  to  gain  pleasure  is  clearly  a  sufficient 
motive  of  wit,  there  are  other  motives  which  may  par- 
ticipate in  its  production.  Though  wit-making  is  an 
excellent  means  of  obtaining  pleasure  from  the  psychic 
processes,  we  know  that  not  all  persons  are  equally  able 
to  make  use  of  it.  Wit  making  is  not  at  the  disposal  of 
everybody;  indeed'  few  persons  seem  to  possess  this  gift. 
It  is  entirely  independent  of  intelligence,  phantasy, 
memory,  etc.  A  special  talent  or  psychic  determination 
permitting  or  favoring  wit  making  must  be  presupposed 
in  all  wits.  It  is  not  often  possible  to  investigate  this 
theme;  only  now  and  then  can  we  enter  into  the  sub- 
jective determinations  in  the  mind  of  the  wit  maker. 
The  physician  indeed  occasionally  has  opportuntiy  to 
study  persons  who,  if  not  renowned  wits,  are  recognized 
in  their  circle  as  witty;  and  he  is  often  surprised  to  find 
such  persons  showing  dissociated  personalities  and  a 
predisposition  to  nervous  affections.  Owing,  however^ 
to  insufficient  investigations  this  cannot  be  put  down  as 
a  general  rule.  A  clearer  case  is  afforded  by  jokes  of 
Jewish  subject-matter,  and  made  exclusively  by  Jews- 
The  determinant  for  the  self-participation  seems  to  be 
plain.  It  is  due  to  the  fact  that  the  person  finds  it  diffi- 
cult to  directly  express  his  criticism  and  aggression  and  is 
thus  compelled  to  resort  to  byways.  Jewish  jokes  not 
produced  by  Jews  never  rise  above  the  level  of  the  comical 
strain  or  the  brutal  mockery.  The  motive  for  the  pro- 
duction of  harmless  wit  is  usually  the  ambitious  impulse 
"to  show  off,"  or  to  give  a  favorable  impression.  It  is  an 
impulse    comparable    to    the    sexual    exhibition.     The 

24 


370  PSYCHANALYSIS 

existence  of  numerous  inhibited  impulses,  the  suppression 
of  which  retains  a  certain  degree  of  lability,  produces  a 
state  favorable  for  the  production  of  the  tendency  wit. 
Certain  components  of  the  sexual  constitution  may 
appear  as  motives  for  wit  formation.  Persons  inclined 
to  obscene  joking  usually  conceal  a  desire  to  exhibit. 
Persons  having  a  powerful  sadistic  component  in  their 
sexuality,  which  is  more  or  less  inhibited,  are  most  suc- 
cessful with  the  tendency  wit  of  aggression.  It  is  univer- 
sally known  that  no  person  is  satisfied  with  making  wit 
for  himself.  Wit  making  is  inseparably  connected  with 
the  desire  to  impart  it.  To  impart  the  comical  to  another 
person  is  pleasurable,  but  one  can  enjoy  it  alone,  while 
wit  must  be  imparted.  Apparently  the  psychic  process 
of  wit  formation  does  not  end  with  the  conception  of  the 
wit.  There  is  something  left  which  strives  to  complete 
the  mysterious  process  of  wit  formation  by  imparting  it. 
The  wit  producer  is  in  need  of  another  person  to  whom 
the  wit  may  be  imparted.  Wit  is  thus  a  social  process. 
Due  to  the  wit  making,  the  person  who  makes  the  wit 
does  not  laugh  at  his  own  production,  but  he  causes  inhibi- 
tions to  become  superfluous  in  the  hearer  and  thus  cause 
a  discharge  of  the  repression  of  the  hearer  through  laugh- 
ter. The  hearer  may  be  said  to  laugh  with  the  amount 
of  psychic  energy  which  is  set  free  by  the  suspension  of 
inhibitions;  that  is,  we  laugh  away,  as  it  were,  this  amount 
of  psychic  energy.  When  we  laugh  at  a  joke  we  really 
do  not  know  what  we  are  laughing  at;  this  can  be  ascer- 
tained by  analysis.  Laughing  is  the  result  of  an  auto- 
matic process  and  is  possible  only  in  the  absence  of  con- 
scious attention.     It  is  the  property  of  wit  to  exert  its 


freud's  theory  of  wit  371 

full  effect  on  the  hearer  only  when  it  is  new  and  surprising 
to  him.  This  property,  which  causes  wit  to  be  shortlived, 
and  forever  urges  the  production  of  new  wit,  is  appar- 
ently due  to  the  fact  that  it  is  in  the  nature  of  the  surpris- 
ing and  the  unexpected  not  to  succeed  a  second  time. 
When  we  repeat  wit  the  awakened  memory  leads  the 
attention  to  the  first  hearing.  This  also  explains  the  desire 
to  impart  wit  to  others  who  have  not  heard  it  before,  for 
the  impression  made  by  wit  on  the  new  hearer  replenishes 
in  the  wit  maker  that  part  of  the  pleasure  which  has  been 
lost  by  the  lack  of  novelty.  An  analogous  motive  prob- 
ably urges  the  wit  producer  to  impart  his  wit  to  others. 

THE  RELATION  OF  WIT  TO  DREAMS  AND  TO  THE 
UNCONSCIOUS 

It  is  to  be  regretted  that  we  cannot  here  enter  fully  into 
the  deep  psychological  mechanisms  of  dreams,  which 
are  so  essential  to  illustrate  the  similar  mechanisms  of 
wit.  I  will  have  to  refer  the  reader  to  the  last  chapter 
of  Freud's  Interpretation  of  Dreams.  We  may  however 
attempt  to  show  some  of  the  profounder  relations  between 
the  dream  and  wit. 

Besides  the  resemblances  in  the  techniques  of  wit  and 
dreams — condensation,  displacement,  and  so  on — we 
also  find  that  the  formation  of  wit  is  similar  to  the  forma- 
tion of  dreams;  that  is,  afore-conscious  thought  is  left  for  a 
moment  to  the  unconscious  elaboration  and  its  result  is 
forthwith  grasped  by  the  conscious  perception.  Like  the 
dream,  wit  is  an  involuntary  mental  occurrence.  One 
cannot  tell  a  moment  before  what  joke  he  is  going  to 
crack.     One   usually   experiences  something  indefinable 


372  PSYCHANALYSIS 

which  Prof.  Freud  compares  to  an  absence  or  sudden  sus- 
pension of  intellectual  tension,  and  the  wit  then  appears 
suddenly.  Brevity,  too,  is  common  to  both  wit  and 
dreams.  In  both  this  is  the  result  of  the  process  of  con- 
densation. The  thought  which  merges  into  the  uncon- 
scious for  the  purpose  of  forming  wit  seeks  there  the 
infantile  play  with  words,  for  the  infantile  is  the  source 
of  the  unconscious.  The  thought  is  put  back  for  a 
moment  into  the  infantile  stage  in  order  to  regain  pos- 
session of  the  childish  pleasure  sources.  As  has  already 
been  demonstrated  in  the  psychology  of  the  neuroses  the 
peculiar  elaboration  of  wit  is  only  an  infantile  type  of 
thinking.  The  dream,  also,  wherein  the  child  with  all 
its  impulses  continues  to  live,  has  its  origin  in  the  infantile 
life. 

Besides  the  many  resemblances  between  dreams  and 
wit  we  can  also  discover  some  differences.  The  most 
important  difference  lies  in  their  social  behavior.  The 
dream  is  a  perfect  asocial  psychic  product;  having  origi- 
nated in  a  person  as  a  compromise  between  strug- 
gling psychic  streams,  it  remains  incomprehensible  to 
the  person  himself,  and  has  no  interest  or  information 
for  anybody  else.  Wit,  on  the  other  hand,  is  the 
most  social  of  all  the  psychic  functions  aiming  to  gain 
pleasure;  it  often  requires  three  persons,  and  the  psychic 
process  which  it  incites  always  requires  the  participation 
of  at  least  one  other  person.  The  dream  is  a  hidden  wish, 
while  wit  is  a  developed  play.  Despite  all  its  apparent 
unreality  the  dream  retains  its  relation  to  the  important 
practical  interests  of  life;  it  seeks  to  fulfill  the  needs 
through   a   regressive   detour  of  hallucinations,   and   it 


freud's  theory  of  wit  373 

owes  its  existence  to  the  strong  need  for  sleep  during  the 
night.  Wit,  on  the  other  hand,  seeks  to  draw  a  small 
amount  of  pleasure  from  the  free  activities  of  our  psychic 
apparatus,  and  to  seize  this  pleasure  as  an  incidental  gain. 
It  thus  extends  secondarily  to  important  functions  relative 
to  the  outer  world.  The  dream  serves  preponderate^ 
to  guard  from  pain,  while  wit  serves  to  acquire  pleasure, 
but  all  our  psychic  activities  meet  in  these  two  aims. 

WIT  AND  THE  COMIC 

Comic  differs  from  wit  in  its  social  behavior.  The 
comic  is  content  with  only  two  persons,  one  who  finds 
the  comical  and  one  in  whom  it  is  found.  A  third  person 
to  whom  the  comical  may  be  imparted  reinforces  the 
comic  process,  but  adds  nothing  new  to  it.  In  wit  the 
third  person  is  indispensable  for  the  protection  of  the 
pleasure-bearing  process,  while  the  second  person  may  be 
omitted,  especially  when  we  do  not  deal  with  tendency 
and  aggressive  wit.  Wit  is  made,  while  the  comical  is 
found.  The  comic  is  usually  found  first  in  persons,  and 
later  by  transference  it  may  be  seen  also  in  objects, 
situations,  etc.  We  also  know  that  wit  occasionally 
reopens  inaccessible  sources  of  the  comic,  and  that  the 
comic  often  serves  to  wit  as  a  facade  to  replace  the 
fore-pleasure. 

That  form  of  comic  which  is  nearest  to  wit  is  the  naive 
or  ingenuous.  The  naive,  like  the  comic,  is  usually 
found  and  not  made.  It  must  result  without  our  inter- 
vention from  the  speech  and  actions  of  other  persons, 
and  it  can  only  be  produced  by  persons  who  have  no 


374  PSYCHANALYSIS 

inhibitions  to  overcome.  What  conditions  the  functions 
of  the  naive  is  the  fact  that  we  are  aware  that  the  person 
does  not  possess  this  inhibition;  otherwise  we  should  not 
call  it  naive,  but  impudent,  and  instead  of  laughing  we 
should  be  indignant.  The  effect  of  the  naive  which  is 
irresistible,  seems  easy  to  understand.  The  inhibition 
which  is  usually  formed  in  us  suddenly  becomes  inappli- 
cable when  we  hear  the  naive,  and  is  discharged  through 
laughing.  As  the  removal  of  the  inhibition  is  direct,  and 
not  the  result  of  an  incited  operation,  there  is  no  need 
for  a  suspension  of  attention.  We  behave  like  the  hearer 
in  wit,  to  whom  the  economy  of  inhibition  is  given  with- 
out any  effort  on  his  part.  The  naive  is  mostly  found  in 
children  in  whom  no  inhibitions  are  developed  and  in 
uneducated  adults,  whom  we  consider  as  children  in 
reference  to  their  intellectual  development.  The  follow- 
ing examples  will  serve  as  illustrations. 

Little  Boy:  "I  want  the  doctor  to  come  to  our  house.' ' 
Servant:  "Where  do  you  come  from?"  Little  Boy: 
'  'Don't  you  know  me?  Why,  we  do  business  with  you;  we 
had  a  baby  from  here  last  week." 

Said  a  farmer:  "I  understand  that  they  make  instru- 
ments with  which  the  stars  and  planets  can  be  examined. 
That  I  know  is  possible;  but  how  the  learned  men  dis- 
covered the  names  of  the  stars  and  planets — that  I  cannot 
understand." 

The  examples  of  naivetd  do  not  apparently  differ  from 
wit  in  either  structure  or  technique.  It  is  merely  a  ques- 
tion whether  the  speaker  intends  to  be  witty,  or  whether^ 
owing  to  his  uncorrected  ignorance,  he  is  serious  or  means 
precisely  what  he  says.     In  the  latter  case  we  deal  with 


freud's  theory  of  wit  375 

the  naive.  The  naive  agrees  with  wit  in  both  structure 
and  content,  but  the  psychic  process  of  the  first  person  or 
producer,  which  is  so  interesting  in  wit,  is  here  entirely 
absent.  The  ingenuous  person  imagines  that  he  is  using 
his  thoughts  and  expressions  in  a  simple  and  normal 
manner;  he  has  no  other  purpose  in  view,  and  receives  no 
pleasure  from  his  naive  productions.  Thus  the  little  boy 
believed  that  children  are  obtained  from  the  doctor, 
and  the  farmer  actually  thought  that  every  star  and 
planet  comes  into  existence  with  a  definite  name,  which 
men  of  science  have  a  way  of  discovering.  All  the  char- 
acters of  the  naive  lie  in  the  conception  of  the  hearer,  who 
corresponds  to  the  third  person  of  the  wit.  The  producing 
person  creates  the  naive  without  any  effort.  The  com- 
plicated technique  which  in  wit  serves  to  paralyze  the 
inhibition  produced  by  the  critical  reason  does  not  exist 
here,  because  the  person  does  not  yet  possess  this  inhibi- 
tion, and  he  can  therefore  readily  produce  the  senseless 
and  the  obscene  without  any  compromise. 

We  have  said  above  that  the  effective  determinant  of 
wit  consists  in  the  fact  that  both  persons  should  be  sub- 
jected to  about  the  same  inhibition  of  inner  resistances. 
We  may  say  now  that  the  determinant  of  the  naive  con- 
sists in  the  fact  that  one  person  should  have  inhibitions 
which  the  other  lacks.  It  is  the  person  provided  with 
inhibitions  who  understands  the  naive,  and  it  is  he  alone 
who  gains  the  pleasure  produced  by  the  naive.  This, 
as  we  know,  is  due  to  the  removal  of  inhibitions.  But 
in  order  to  recognize  the  naive  we  have  to  be  cognizant 
of  the  fact  that  there  are  no  inner  inhibitions  in  the 
producing  persons.     It  is  only  when  this  is  assured  that 


37G  PSYCHANALYSIS 

we  laugh,  instead  of  being  indignant.  We  take  into 
consideration  the  psychic  state  of  the  producing  person; 
we  imagine  ourselves  in  the  same,  and  endeavor  to  under- 
stand  it  by  comparing  it  to  our  own  psychic  state.  This 
putting  ourselves  into  the  psychic  state  of  the  producing 
person  and  comparing  it  with  our  own  results  in  an 
economy  of  expenditure  which  we  discharge  through 
laughing.  This  strange  mechanism  is  perhaps  the  essen- 
tial part  of  the  psychic  process  of  the  comic.  Looking 
at  it  from  this  viewpoint  the  naive  is  a  form  of  the  comic. 
The  pleasure  produced  by  the  naive  is  "comical"  pleasure. 
It  originates  through  an  economy  of  expenditure  by  com- 
paring the  utterances  of  some  one  else  with  our  own. 
The  comical,  therefore,  results  in  an  unintentional  dis- 
covery in  the  social  relations  of  men.  It  is  found  in 
persons,  that  is,  in  then  movements,  shapes,  actions,  etc., 
and  sometimes  also  in  animals  and  inanimate  objects. 

The  comical  can  be  removed  from  the  person  in  whom  it 
is  found  if  the  condition  under  which  a  person  becomes 
comical  can  be  recognized.  This  shows  that  there  is  a 
comical  situation  into  which  any  person  can  place  himself 
or  others  to  appear  comical.  The  means  which  can  effect 
this  are:  transference  into  comic  situations,  imitation, 
disguise,  unmasking,  caricature,  parody,  travesty,  etc. 
As  can  be  seen,  the  sphere  of  origin  for  the  comic  is  con- 
siderably broader  than  that  of  the  naive.  In  order  to 
trace  the  determination  of  the  comic  we  will  examine  the 
comic  movement. 

We  laugh  at  the  actions  of  clowns  because  they  appear 
to  us  immoderate  and  inappropriate,  that  is,  we  really 
laugh    over    the    excessive    expenditure.     The    child's 


freud's  theory  of  wit  377 

emotions  do  not  appear  to  us  comical  even  if  it  jumps  and 
fidgets,  but  it  is  comical  to  see  a  little  boy  follow  with  his 
tongue  the  movements  of  his  pen  when  he  is  trying  to 
master  the  art  of  writing.  We  see  in  this  additional 
motion  a  superfluous  expenditure  of  energy  which  we 
should  save  under  similar  conditions.  In  the  same  way 
we  find  it  comical  to  see  a  marked  exaggeration  of  expres- 
sive motions  in  adults.  Thus  we  laugh  at  grimaces  which 
exaggerate  the  normal  expressions  of  emotions,  even  if 
they  are  involuntary,  as  in  chorea  and  tics.  We  laugh 
because  we  compare  the  motions  observed  in  others  with 
those  which  we  ourselves  should  produce  if  we  were  in 
their  place.  That  person  appears  to  us  comical  who 
puts  forth  too  much  expenditure  in  his  physical  functions 
and  too  little  in  his  psychic.  Our  laughing  in  both 
cases  expresses  a  pleasant  feeling  of  superiority  which  we 
attribute  to  ourselves  when  we  compare  ourselves  with 
him.  This  is  one  of  the  most  important  factors  in  the 
genesis  of  the  comic. 

The  difference  between  the  comic  and  wit  is  found  in 
the  chief  psychological  character  of  the  comic.  The 
pleasure  source  of  wit  we  have  found  in  the  unconscious, 
but  there  is  no  reason  for  the  same  localization  of  the 
comic.  On  the  contrary,  all  the  analyses  point  to  the 
fact  that  the  source  of  the  comical  pleasure  is  the  com- 
parison of  two  expenditures  which  we  must  attribute  to 
the  fore-conscious.  The  main  difference  between  wit 
and  comic  is  found  in  the  psychic  localization;  wit  is, 
so  to  say,  the  contribution  of  the  comic  from  the  sphere 
of  the  unconscious. 

Without  entering  into  the  details  of  other  forms  of  the 


378  PSYCHANALYSIS 

comic  we  will  briefly  discuss  humor.  Humor  is  the 
means  of  obtaining  pleasure  despite  existing  painful 
effects.  If  we  are  in  a  situation  which  causes  us  to  liber- 
ate painful  affects,  and  motives  then  urge  us  to  suppress 
the  same  in  statu  nascendi,  we  have  the  conditions  for 
humor.  Thus  persons  afflicted  with  misfortune,  pain, 
etc.,  can  gain  humoristic  pleasure  while  the  onlookers 
laugh  over  the  comical  pleasure.  The  pleasure  of  humor 
results  at  the  cost  of  this  discontinued  liberation  of  affect » 
it  originates  through  an  economy  of  emotional  expendi- 
ture. Humor  does  not  require  the  participation  of 
another  person;  one  can  enjoy  the  pleasure  of  humor 
without  feeling  the  necessity  of  imparting  it  to  another. 
To  understand  the  psychological  mechanisms  of  humor- 
istic pleasure  it  is  best  to  examine  the  so-called  "grim 
humor"  (Galgenhumor),  where  we  regularly  find  that 
humor  is  produced  at  the  cost  of  a  great  expenditure  of 
psychic  work.  Economy  of  sympathy  is  one  of  the  most 
frequent  causes  of  humoristic  pleasure.  Mark  Twain's 
humor  usually  shows  this  mechanism. 

Humor  stands  nearer  to  the  comic  than  wit.  Like  the 
comic  it  is  located  in  the  fore-conscious,  whereas  wit  is 
formed  as  a  compromise  between  the  unconscious  and 
fore-conscious. 

We  have  shown  that  the  pleasure  of  wit  originates  from 
an  economy  of  expenditure  in  inhibition,  of  the  comic 
from  an  economy  of  expenditure  in  thought,  and  of  humor 
from  an  economy  of  expenditure  in  feeling.  All  three 
activities  of  our  psychic  apparatus  derive  pleasure  from 
economy.  They  all  strive  to  bring  back  from  the  psychic 
activity  a  pleasure  which  has  been  lost  in  the  develop- 


FREUD  S    THEORY    OF    WIT  379 

ment  of  this  activity;  for  the  euphoria  which  we  are  thus 
striving  to  obtain  is  nothing  but  the  state  of  a  bygone 
time  in  which  we  were  wont  to  defray  our  psychic  work 
with  slight  expenditure.  It  is  the  state  of  our  childhood 
in  which  we  did  not  know  the  comic,  were  incapable  of 
wit,  and  did  not  need  humor  to  make  us  happy. 

References 

1.  An  English  translation  in  preparation. 

2.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  12. 

3.  Hamlet,  Act  II,  Scene  II,  1.90. 

4.  The  Interpretation  of  Dreams.     George  Allen  Co.,  London,  and 
The  Macmillan  Co.,  New  York.     Cf.  also  Chap.  II. 

5.  Cf.  Chap.  II. 

6.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  25. 

7.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  26. 

8.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  36. 

9.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  37. 

10.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  47. 

11.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  50. 

12.  Freud:  L.  c,  p.  50. 

13.  Translated  by  A.  A.  Brill,  Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental  Dis- 
eases.    Monograph  series,  No.  7. 

14.  Cf.  Chap.  II,  p.  44.  The  obscene  joke  formed  by  the  sound 
associations  bald-balled  fulfils  all  the  conditions  of  the  purposive 
smutty  joke. 

15.  Cf.  Chap.  VI. 

16.  Cf.  Chap.  VI. 


GLOSSARY 


Abasia.     Inability  to  walk. 

Abreaction  (ab,  off,  away,  and  react,  to  act  again).  The 
process  of  working  off  a  past  disagreeable  experience  by 
living  through  it  again  in  speech  or  action  in  the  presence 
of  the  psychanalyst. 

Affect.     Sum  of  excitation,  or  emotion. 

Algolagnia  (algos,  pain,  and  lagnos,  sexually  excited).  Sexual 
excitement  in  causing  or  experiencing  pain. 

Ambivalent  Feelings.  The  emotions  of  love  and  hatred  ex- 
perienced at  the  same  time  for  one  person. 

Amnesia.  A  memory  defect  extending  over  a  definite  and 
circumscribed  period  while  the  rest  of  the  memory  is 
intact. 

Aphonia.     Speechlessness. 

Astasia.     Inability  to  stand. 

Auto-erotism.  Self  gratification,  one  of  the  main  charac- 
teristics in  the  psychosexual  life  of  children. 

Bisexual  (of  both  sexes).     A  sexual  feeling  for  both  sexes. 

Blocking.  A  sudden  stop  in  the  association  produced  when 
a  complex  is  touched. 

Catharsis.  A  mental  purging  produced  by  bringing  to  the 
surface  disagreeable  or  painful  thoughts  and  experiences. 

Cloaca  Theory.  The  theory  assumed  by  children  and  some 
neurotics  that  the  child  comes  out  like  a  passage  of  the 
bowels,  because  they  know  of  only  one  opening  that  forms 
an  outlet  from  the  body. 

Complex.     A  series  of  emotionally  accentuated  ideas  in  a 

repressed  state. 

380 


GLOSSARY  381 

Condensation.      A  fusion  of  events,  thoughts  and  pictures. 
Conscious.    Mental  processes  of  which  we  are  aware  at  a 

given  moment. 
Contamination.     A  fusion  of  words. 
Conversion.     The  process  by  which  sums  of  emotion  become 

transformed  into  physical  manifestations. 
Coprophilia.     Liking  for  filth. 
Delusion.     False  idea  which  cannot  be  influenced  by  any 

logic. 
Dementia  Praecox.     A  form  of  insanity. 
Dipsomania.     A  periodic  uncontrollable  desire  for  drink. 
Displacement.     A  substitution  of  one  idea  for  another,  or 

an  exchange  of  a  colorless  and  abstract  expression  in  the 

dream-thought  for  one  that  is  visual  and  concrete. 
Erogenous  Zone.     An  organ,  which  if  stimulated  bestows  on 

the  impulse  a  sexual  character. 
Erotomania.     An   extravagant   affection   for   some   person, 

usually  of  the  opposite  sex,  manifested  in  some  forms  of 

insanity. 
Euphoria.     Feeling  of  well  being. 
Exhibitionism.     Sexual  gratification  experienced  in  the  act 

of  exhibiting  the  sexual  organs. 
Fellatio.    The  apposition  of  the  mouth  to  the  male  organ. 
Fore-conscious.     Mental    processes   which   cannot   become 

conscious  unless  certain  conditions  are  fulfilled. 
Hallucination.     A  sensory  impression,  like  hearing  or  seeing, 

which  originates  in  the  brain  without  any  corresponding 

external  stimulus. 
Heterosexuality.     Love  for  persons  of  the  opposite  sex. 

Homosexuality.     Love  for  persons  of  the  same  sex. 

Idiogamist.  One  capable  of  coitus  with  only  one  particular 
woman,  or  with  only  a  few  selected  ones,  and  either  abso- 
lutely or  nearly  impotent  with  all  the  rest. 

Libido.     Sexual  craving. 

Maoschism.  Sexual  excitement  accompanied  by  the  wish 
to  be  physically  subdued  and  hurt  by  the  sexual  object. 


382 


GLOSSARY 


Narcism.  A  partial  or  complete  sexual  excitement  through 
the  admiration  of  one's  own  body. 

Noopsyche.     Intellectual  processes. 

Over-determination.  To  gain  access  to  a  dream  or  neurotic 
symptom  every  element  must  be  connected  with  it  by 
many  associations,  hence  every  element  of  the  dream  can 
have  many  meanings. 

Pseudologia  phantastica.     Pathological  liars. 

Sadism.  Sexual  excitement  accompanied  by  the  wish  to 
cause  pain  to  the  sexual  object. 

Schizophrenia.     See  dementia  prsecox. 

Secondary  elaboration.  The  effort  to  bring  coherence  and 
order  into  the  conglomerations  and  inconsistencies  of  the 
dream  content  when  the  latter  is  grasped  by  conscious- 
ness. 

Skatologic.     Relating  to  fecal  matter. 

Somatic.     Phvsical. 

Somnambulism.  A  state  in  which  walking  or  other  com- 
plicated acts  are  performed  during  sleep. 

Sublimation.  The  process  of  deviating  sexual  motive 
powers  from  sexual  aims  to  new  aims  other  than  sexual. 

Thymopsyche.     Affective  processes. 

Tic.     Spasm  of  muscles. 

Transference.  A  displacement  of  affect  from  one  idea  to 
another,  or  from  one  person  to  another. 

Unconscious.  Mental  processes  which  cannot  be  brought 
to  consciousness  without  external  aid. 

Voyeurs.  Persons  who  attain  sexual  gratification  by  look- 
ing at  sexual  objects. 

Zoophilia  Erotic.  Sexual  excitement  or  gratification  evoked 
by  the  patting,  touching,  etc.,  of  animals. 


INDEX 


Abraham,  206,  207,  251,  255,  276,    Anal  eroticism,  321,  323 


292,  320 
Abreaction,  15 
Abstinence,  116 
Absurd,  343,  362 
Absurdity,  342,  349,  361 
Accordance,  360 
Actions,  376 
Activity,  330 

Acts  of  becoming  unconscious,  108, 
109 

of  pertinence,  107 

of  prevention,  107 

revengful,  323 
Actual  neurosis,  81 

distinguished     from     psycho- 
neurosis,  88 
Adjustment,  195,  206 
Affects,  14 

compulsive,  107 

dislocation  of,  18 

of  shame,  16 

opposing,  27 

painful,  378 
Aggression,  104,  117,  351 

hostile,  357 

sexual,  110,  354 
Aim,  25 

sexual,  321,  352 
Alcoholic  indulgence,  362 
Alcoholics,  198 

Alexander  the  Great,  legend  of,  39 
Algolagnia,  293 
Allan,  R.  A.,  312 
Alliteration,  360 
Allusion,  349,  360 
Ambivalent,  286 
Amnesia,  26 


zone,  322 
Anecdote,  343,  347 
Animals,  376 

in  dreams,  113 
Anus,  21,  321 
Anxiety,  82 

equivalents  of,  83 

hysteria,  48 
dreams,  54 
states,  54 

in  climacterium,  87 

in  intentional  abstainers,  87 

in  senility,  87 

neurosis,  81 

etiology  and  occurrence,  85 
symptoms  of,  81 
through  overwork,  88 
Aphonia,  89 
Arc  de  cercle,  246 
Aristotle,  330 
Artificial  dreams,  77 
Asnaourow,  318,  320 
Asocial,  372 

Assistance,  principle  of,  366 
Association  experiment,  141 
Associations,    28,    138,    169,    172, 
173,  180 

inner,  360 

rules  of,  60 
Astasia  abasia,  89,  247 
Attention,  68,  138 

suspension  of,  374 

test  of,  69 
Autoerotic,  282 

character,  21 
Autoerotism,  193,  195,  206 
Automatic,  345 


383 


:;st 


INDEX 


Automatisms,  100,  165,  182,  275, 

282,  345 
Avariciousness,  323 

Bailey,  121 

Beers,  80 

Beling,  102 

Bernheim,  15,  130 

Bisexual,  249 

Bladder,  21,  321 

Blasphemous  thoughts,  121 

Bleuler,  69,  138,  146,  165,  187,  188, 

206,  207,  212,  276 
Bloch,  273,  279 
Blocking,  94,  215 
Bowels,  control  of,  321 
Breuer,  12,  15,  130 
Brevity,  372 

Caricature,  376 
Catharsis,  15 
Censor,  166 

fear  of,  36 
Character,  23,  108,  282 

illogical,  340 

of  wit,  351 

peculiar  traits  of,  64,  323 

type  of,  194 
Charade,  335 
Child,  38,  362,  372 

and  symbolism,  67 

desires  of,  41 

favorite,  279 
Childhood,  282,  356,  379 
Children,  association  with,  289 

favorite,  272,  282 

only,  288 
Citations,  360 
Civilization,  263 
Cleanliness,  323 
Cloaca  theory,  128,  380 
Clowns,  376 
Cohen,  243 
Coitus,  272 

disgusting,  25 

interruptus,  86,  90,  92,  111 


Coitus  reservatus,  86 
Collecting  manias,  234 
among  insane,  239 
College  cries,  362 
Colloquialisms,  71 
Comic,  373 

Comical,  370,  373,  377 
Compensation,  121 
Complex,  35,  210 
definition  of,  142 
disturbance  of,  155 
indicator,  56,  141 
main,  95 
Components,  21 

homosexual,  22,  117 
incestuous,  287 
masochistic,  23 
sadistic,  23,  110,  114,  258 
Compromise,  17,  25,  27,  182,  378 
Compulsion  neurosis,  18,  102,  322, 
327 
cause  of,  105 
definition  of,  103 
explanation  of,  115 
formula  of,  105 
mechanism  of,  104 
periods  of,  105 
Condensation,    46,    52,    162,   333, 
338,  351,  371 
with  substitution,  332,  349 
Condom,  90 
Conflict,  25,  182,  259 
in  paranoia,  196 
mental,  25,  95 
Confusion,  330 
Conscious  perception,  371 
Consciousness,  37,  208 
flight  from,  109 
function  of,  209 
splitting  of,  17,  36 
Constellations,  182 
Constipation,  obstinate,  326 
Constitution,  abnormal  sexual,  24 

sexual,  24,  370 
Contamination,  162 
Contracture,  25,  89 


INDEX 


385 


Conversion,  17,  27,  246 

adaptation  for,  18 

hysteria,  89 

process  of,  17 
Conversions,  159 
Convulsions,  89 
Coprophilic  activities,  248 
Coriat,  277 
Courtship,  353 
Crisis,  163 
Cruelty,  22,  111,  258,  328 

its  relation  to  sex,  258 
Cryptogram,  31 
Curiosity,  118,  353 


Day  dreams,  156 

remnants,  45 
Defense,  351 

mechanism    of    defense    neuro- 
psychosis, 18 

neuropsychosis,  18,  104 
Degenerative,  24 

Delusions  of  grandeur,   199,  205, 
206 

of  jealousy,  198 

of  observation,  106 

of  persecution,  192,  197 

of  poverty,  239 

of  self-accusation,  181 
Dementia,  186,  187 

precox,  145,  155,  187,  206,  282, 
285 
characteristic  of,  179 
Depreciation,  284 
Depression,  91,  284 

recurrence  of,  99 
Desires,  primitive,  38 
Detached  affect,  18 
Deterioration,  349 

hereditary,  24 
Diarrhoea,  84 
Differentiation   between  dementia 

precox  and  paranoia,  206 
Dipsomania,  108 
Discrimination,  69 
25 


Disfigurement,  200 
Disguise,  364,  376 
Disgust,  23 
Dislikes,  280 
Disorder,  323 

Displacement,   47,  .117,  340,   341, 
349,  351,  361,  371 

from  below  to  above,  56 
Disposition,  hostile,  356 
Disproportion,  179 
Dissimilarities,  union  of,  330 
Dissociations,  165 
Distortion,  36,  117 
Distraction,  139 
Double  meaning,  336 
Doubts,  18,  102,  120,  327 
Dream,  27,  33,  349,  350,  371 

early  Greek  theories,  33 

formation  of,  37 

future  realization  of,  324 

inhibition  in,  52 

interpretation  of,  30,  93 

CEpidus,  268 

of  resolution,  76 

relation  to  normal  and  abnormal 
life,  34 

symbols  in,  67 

thoughts  as  expressed  in  Bible, 
33 

wish  of,  37 

work,  45,  333 
Dreams  and  poetry,  68 

artificial,  77 

forgetting  of,  54,  113 

in  diagnosis,  54 

intellectual  activity  in,  47 

judgment  in,  48 

logical  relationships,  48 

of  a  painful  nature,  42 

reasoning  in,  48 

similarity  in,  48 
Dreamy  states,  244,  251 
examples  of,  253 
psychological   significance   of, 
256 
Dyspnea,  84 


386 


INDEX 


Economy,  323,  359,  374,  378 

of  expression,  338 
Ego,  205 

complex,  160,  166,  182 

incompatibility  with,  16 
Ejaculatio  praccox,  86 
Ellipses,  117 
Ellis,  H.,  273,  320 
Emotion,  377 

discharge  of,  96 

strangulation  of,  14 
Empiricism,  280 
Enemy,  356 
Erogenous  zones,  22,  282,  321,  327, 

348 
Eros,  20,  150 
Erotic  interest,  326 
Eroticism,  321 
Erotomania,  192,  197,  198 
Erroneously    carried-out    actions, 

220 
Esthetic  culture,  367 
Ethical  training,  38 
Euphemisms,  36 
Euphoria,  176,  379 
Excitement,  peripheral,  21 

sexual,  352 

sum  of,  15 
Exhibition,  352 

Exhibitionism,  22,  111,  258,  259 
Exhibitionists,  285 

Fabrications,  251 
Factor,  causative,  25 

characteristic  of  hysteria,  89 
Fairy  tales,  293 
False  connection,  18 
Familiar,  discovery  of,  360,  363 
Fancies,  conscious,  246 

hysterical,  244 

sexual,  97 

unconscious,  245 
Father  image,  280 
Fear  in  dreams,  42,  93,  164,  272 

in  newly  married,  86 

of  betrayal,  108 


Fear,  social,  106 

virginal,  86 
Fechner,  366 
Federn,  316 
Feelings,  esthetic,  23 

homosexual,  194 

incestuous,  272 

moral,  23 

sexual,  24 

among   brothers   and   sisters, 
273 

social,  282 
F6re,  79 

Ferenczi,  193,  207,  276,  278,  292 
Fiction,  362 
Fischer,  330 
Fishberg,  290 

Fixation,   14,   194,  196,  202,  272, 
279,  282,  288 

incestuous,  272,  277 

in  narcism,  205 
Folie  du  doute,  92,  120 
Fore-conscious,  208,  209,  371,  377 
Fore-pleasure,  373 

meaning  of,  368 
Forel,  82 
Forgetting  of  dreams,  113 

of  names,  28,  211,  212 

of  objects,  368 

of  resolutions,  220 
Forgotten  impressions,  16 
Free  associations,  29 
Freud,  12,  15,  20,  21,  23,  24,  28,  80, 

81,  86,  101,  104,  108,  114,  124, 

128,  130,  132,  137,  138,  146,  165, 

181,  183,  192,  193,  194,  203,  206, 

207,  208,  209,  213,  229,  243,  244, 

255,  261,  263,  276,  279,  291,320, 

323,  372 
Friedj  ung,  291 

Ganser,  251 
Generalization,  117 
Genitals,  21,  321 
primacy  of,  22 
Germs,  285 


INDEX 


387 


Gratification,  86,  354 

insufficient,  88 

sexual,  245 
Gregory,  M.  S.,  19,  183 
Grim-humor,  349,  378 
Groos,  362 

Hallucinations,  160,  372 

auditory,  165 

teleological,  165 
Hallucinatory  confusion,  19 
Hauptmann,  33 
Heart  spasm,  83 
Hebephrenic,  207 
Hereditary  lues,  24 

taint,  85 
Heredity,  283 
Heterosexual,  193 
Heterosexuality,  196 
Hindrances,  356 

internal,  359 

outer,  358 
Hobbies,  234 
Hoch,  146 
Holt,  32 
Homosexual,  285 

episode,  250 

object  selection,  193 

pederasts,  327 

relations,  155 
Homosexuality,  54,  101,  195,  200, 
285,  288 

diagnosis  of,  54 

unconscious,  196 
Horseshoe  as  a  talisman,  237 
Humor,  378 

pleasure  of,  378 
Hyperesthesia,  auditory,  82 
Hypnosis,  15 
Hypnotic  state,  12 
Hypnotism,  its  limitations,  15 
Hysteria,  12,  205 

character  of,  192 

symptoms,  12,  17 
Hysterical  accusations,  248 

attacks,  244 


Hysterical  counter-will,  13 
fainting  spells,  109 
fancies,  244 

Idea  of  sudden  death,  83 

of  threatening  insanity,  83 
Ideas,  contrasting,  330 

hypochondriacal,  171 
Ideler,  79 
Identification,  62,  199,  247,  326 

in  hysteria,  200 

unconscious,  222 
Idiogamists,  271 
Illogical  character,  340 

conclusions,  361 
Imitation,  376 
Impressions,  mental,  280 

optical,  353 
Impulse  for  looking,  22,  117 

for  showing,  22,  369 

libidinous,  354 
Impulses,  263 

constitutional,  264 

first  sexual,  270 

partial,  321 

primitive,  23,  208 
Incest,  abhorrence  of,  272 

among  savages,  277 

shyness,  277,  287 
Incongruity,  179 
Indecision,  120 
Indirect  expression,  349,  351 
Individual  psychology,  12 

relations,  282 
Infancy,  21,  321 
Infantile  sexual  theories,  94 

sexuality,  110 
Influences,  toxic,  361 
Inhibiting  process,  40 
Inhibition,  37,  198,  215,  263 

expenditure  in,  378 

inner,  368 

of  decorum,  365 

psychic,  359 

social,  352 

suspension  of,  370 


;;ss 


INDEX 


Inman,  Thomas,  71,  80,  320 
Innervation,  motor,  17,  246 

sensory,  17 

somatic,  18,  20 
Inordinate  appetite,  84 
Insane,  collecting  manias  among, 
239 

utterances,  20,  31 
Insomnia,  91 

cause  of,  82 
Inspirations,  264 
Insult,  psychology  of,  367 
Inversion,  117,  247 
Irritability,  82 

Janet,  17,  130,  160,  182,  187 
Jealousy,  60,  285 
Jest,  368 

its  object,  363 

witty,  335 
Jeu  de'sprit,  335 
Jewish  jokes,  369 

race,  289 
Joke,  36 

hostile,  351 

obscene,  351,  355 

smutty,  351,  352 
its  motive,  352 
Jones,  64,  207,  212,  241,  243,  276, 

278,  320 
Judgment,  350,  364 

critical,  368 
Jung,  35,  79,  101,  13S,  139,  146, 

165,  182,  212,  279,  312,  320 

Kindergarten,  289 
Kleinpaul,  322 
Kraepelin,  145,  146 
Krafft-Ebing,  273 

Lapses  of  talking,  211,  213 

of  writing,  211 
Lapsus  linguae,  56,  223 
Lasegue,  79 

Latency  period,  23,  282,  321 
deferred,  111 


Latent  content,  38 
Laughing,  370,  377 
Laughter,  351,  355 
Libido,  25,  193,  194,  198 

fixation,  259 

for  looking,  352 

for  touching,  352 

withdrawal  of,  203,  204,  205,  206 
Liebman,  188 
Likes,  280 
Loathing,  22,  321 
Logic,  342 

false,  343,  349,  361 

restraint  of,  362 
Losing  objects,  241 
Love,  20,  280 

abnormal,  284,  285 

and  hatred,  118 

between   parents   and   children, 
263 

deflection  of,  281 

doubt  about,  120 

projection  of,  280 

the  struggle  between,  118 
Lowenfeld,  251 

Maeder,  193,  207,  212 

Manic  depressive  insanity,  91 

Manifest  content,  38 

Manifold    application,    336,    338, 

340,  346 
Mannerism,  45 
Mantegazza,  271 
Masochists,  285 

Masturbation,  90,   108,   180,   182, 
245,  255 

false  ideas  concerning,  90 

infantile,  21 

interrupted,  260 

its  universality,  90 

mental,  261 

somnambulistic,  26 
Masturbators,  91 

hypochondriacal  ideas  of,  108 
Maturity,  25 
Measures,  protective,  106 


INDEX 


389 


Mechanism  of  obsessions,  117 
Melancholia,  periodic,  106 
Memory  gaps,  29 

lapses  of,  28,  211 

symbols,  13,  17 
Mental  concentration,  257 

impressions,  280 
Metathesis,  228 
Meyer,  Adolf,  146 
Mind,  exploration  of,  163 
Mislaying,  219 
Missending,  219 
Mistakes  in  printing,  228 

in  reading,  228 

in  speaking,  228 

in  talking,  28,  211 

in  writing,  228 
Modesty,  sexual,  353 
Money  complex,  326 
Morality,  23,  321 
Morbid  perception,  20 
Mother  Goose,  361 
Mother,  ideal,  281 

image,  280 

influence  of,  270 
Mother-in-law,  279,  286 
Mouth,  21,  321 
Movements,  376 
Muscular  cramps,  84 
Music  expressing  the  complex,  240 
Mysophobia,  131 

Nacke,  55 

Naive,  373,  374,  376 

functions  of,  374 
Naivete,  examples  of,  374 
Nancy  school,  11 
Narcism,  193,  194,  195,  205,  282 
Natura  frigida,  126 
Nausea,  249 

hysterical,  56 
Neatness,  325 
Negligence,  323 
Nelken,  312 
Neologisms,  21,  361 
Neter,  279 


Neurasthenia,  etiology  of,  81 

periodic,  106 
Neuroses,  23,  25 

mixed,  255 

unconscious  factors  in,  123 
Neurotic  individual,  288 
Nightmares,  54 
Nocturnal  frights,  84 
Nonsense,  342 
Nonsensical,  343,  349 
Noopsyche,  179 
Normal,  23 

individual,  288 

Object  love,  193,  206,  282 
Obscene  joking,  258,  351,  370 
Obsession,  18,  102,  327 

psychanalysis  of,  29,  58,  117 
Obsessive  thinking,  104 
Obstacles,  the  overcoming  of,  41 
Obstinacy,  323,  326 
Obstinate,  323 

constipation,  346 
Obstruction,  215 
(Edipus  complex,  259,  262,  274 

dreams,  268 

in  psychoses,  275 

legend,  264 
Onanism,  246 
Only  child,  279 

attributes  of,  283 
Orderliness,  325 
Orderly,  323 
Outdoing,  348 

Painful  arm,  25 

idea,  17 
Palpitation,  83 
Paralysis,  25,  89 

of  volition,  119 
Paranoia,  189,  201,  275,  282 

psychological     mechanisms     of, 
189 
Paranoid  condition,  192 

ideas,  289 
Paraphrenia,  207 


390 


INDEX 


Parental  ideals,  280 

influences,  280 
Parents,  fixation  on,  279 

influence  of,  262 

neglect  of,  263 

syphilis  in,  24 
Paresthesia,  84 
Parody,  376 

Partial  impulses,  21,  22,  257 
repression  of,  23 
revival  of,  328 
Passivity,  104 
Pathogenic  ideas,  16 

memory,  105 
Paul,  Jean,  330 
Pavor  nocturnus,  84 
Pedantry,  82 
Pederasty,  111 
Peeper,  353 
Pelletier,  Madeline,  67 
Pelman,  Carl,  238 
Perspiration,  profuse,  83 
Perversions,  23,  101,  285,  288,  353 

negative  of,  24,  329 
Pervert,  199 
Perverts,  25,  246,  291 
Peterson,  79,  187,  247,  256,  322, 

324 
Phantasies,  24 
Phobias,  85,  102,  107,  327 

origin  of,  18 
Pity,  23 
Pleasure,  367 

feeling  of,  351 

inaccessible,  363 

mechanism,  358 

repressed,  326 

sources  of,  351,  362 
Poetry  and  dreams,  68 
Polymorphous  perverse,   23,    114, 

248,  285 
Posthypnotic  suggestions,  130 
Poverty,  delusions  of,  239 
Praying,  121 
Precocious,  283 
Predisposition,  160,  369 


Premium,  368 
Prescott,  F.  C,  68 
Primitive  impulses,  208 

thinking,  67 
Prince,  Morton,  62,  130 
Projection    mechanism,    117,    201, 

206 
Prophylaxis,  288,  291 
Prostitution  complex,  271 
Protective  measures,  106,  121 

mechanisms,  210 
Pseudo-angina  pectoris,  83 
Pseudologia  phantastica,  248 
Pseudonyms,  181 
Psychanalysis,  11,  179,  326 

duration  of,  31 

in  psychoses,  138,  142 

method  of,  29,  92 

of  anxiety  hysteria,  48,  91 

of  hysterical  symptom,  25 
Psychic  censor,  17,  215 

damming,  359 

expenditure,  359,  360,  362 
economy  of,  368 

force,  16,  37,  355 

hindrances,  25 

impotence,  101,  285 

pain,  13 

shocks,  157 

state,  376 

streams,  25,  159,  183,  208 

traumas,  20 

work,  16 
Psychogenesis,  157 
Psychology,  experimental,  138 

individual  factors  of,  12 

of  love  and  hatred,  115 

of  mother-in-law,  279 
Psychoneuroses,  11,  81,  165,  285 

causation  of,  355 
Psychopathological     actions,     29, 

208,  211 
Psychosexual  constitution,  257 

development,  108,  282 

impotence,  269,  272 

life,  100 


INDEX 


391 


Psychosis,  19 
Psychotherapy,  11,  24 

schools  of,  12 
Puberty,  age  of,  20,  321 

beginning  of,  23 
Public  school,  289 
Puns,  338 
Putnam,  276,  320 

Rank,  276,  320 
Reaction  dream,  66 

formations,  321,  325,  327 

time,  139 

types,  139 
Reactions,  23,  139,  258 
Reality,  362 
Reason,  362 
Recantations,  159 
Rectum,  325 
Reduplications,  361 
Refrain,  360 
Regression,  194,  206 

of  sublimation,  198 
Reliability,  325 
Religion,  263 
Remarks,  witty,  357 
Reminiscences,  hysterical,  13 
Remote  analogies,  68 
Repartee,  346 
Representation   through   opposite, 

347,  349,  363 
Repression,  16,  25,  206,  209,  248, 
285,  355,  356,  365 

conception  of,  35 

failure  of,  17,  327 

phases  of,  202 

retarded,  327 
^return  of,  106 
Reproaches,  105 
Reproachful  actions,  106 
Reproduction    in    the    association 
experiment,  55,  56,  241 

of  traumatic  scenes,  15 
Resistances,  54,  210,  350,  362 

the  overcoming  of,  16 

unconscious,  112 


Respiratory  disturbances,  83 

Resultant  pleasure,  333,  366 

Retort,  358 

Retrogression,  194 

Reveries,  156 

Rhyme,  360 

Riklin,  138,  146,  212,  320 

Sadger,  193,  291,  292,  313,  314 
Sadism  in  fairy  tales,  314 
Sadist,  259,  285 
Sadistic  component,  110,  114,  287 

conception,  94 
Sante  de  Sanctis,  79 
Satire,  351 

Schizophrenia,  168,  187,  206 
Schizophrenic,  40,  206 
Screaming  spells,  109 
Scrupulosity,  81,  105,  323 

meaning  of,  65 
Secondary  defense,  106 

elaboration,  47 

rationalization,  203 
Seduction,  sexual,  105 
Selection,  353 

of  professions,  231 

prehistoric,  287 
Self-willed,  323 
Semi-stuporous  state,  109 
Senseless,  363,  375 
Sex,  abnormal,  285 
Sexual  aims,  321 

anesthesia,  86,  101,-285— 

attack.  95 

barriers,  282 

conception  of,  20 

constitution,  23,  24 

curiosity,  353 

development,  21 

excitations,  24 

experiences  of  childhood,  20 

germs,  21 

gratification,  245 

ignorance,  20 

impulse,  20,  21,  282 

object,  205,  277,  352,  353 


392 


INDEX 


Sexual  overestimation,  286 

perverse  activity,  25 

somatic  injuries,  89 

suppression,  1G5 

symbols,  98,  334 

theories,  23 
Sexualization,  194.  195 
Shaking  attacks,  84 
Shame,  22,  105,  106,  109,  321 
Shapes,  376 

Similar  and  cognate,  348 
Skatological,  322 

obsessions,  327 
Skylarking,  362 
Smile,  351 
Social  aims,  22 

cultivation,  355 

feelings,  194,  195,  282 
Society,  356 
Somatic  innervation,  18 
Somnambulism,  16 
Son-in-law,  287 
Sophism,  345 
Spectator,  passive,  356 
Spielrein,  312 

Stekel,  79,  89,  101,  276,  292 
Stereotype,  186 
Stimulus  words,  139 
Strangulated  emotions,  14,  17 
Straus,  251 

Sublimation,  22,  194,  195,  353 
Substitution,  117,  347 
Substitutive  formation,  17,  333 

gratifications,  255 
Suggestions,  160,  163 
Suicide,  explanation  of,  183 

methods  of,  182 
Sully,  J.,  79 
Superiority,  377 
Superstition,  326 
Symbol,  93 

definition  of,  67 

gross  sexual,  71 
Symbolic  actions,  159, 186,  229,  232 

expressions,  29,  71,  164,  184,  215 

suicide,  183 


Symbolism,  36,  56,  58,  75 

in  hallucinations,  68 

in  insanity,  68 

in  religion,  48,  68 
Symboli/ation  in  dreams,  71 
Sympathy,  economy  of,  378 
Symptoms,  25 

as  expression  of  wish  fulfilment, 
58 

hysterical,  246 

psychoneurotic,  28 
Syphilis  in  parents,  24 

Tabula  rasa,  280 
Tachycardia,  83 
Teleological,  165 

Tendency  wit,  258,  355,  356,  358, 
363 

hostile,  356 
Test  person,  140 

words,  140 
Thoughts,  witty,  339 
Thumbsucking,  21 
Thymopsyche,  179 
Tic,  13 

Transference,  195,  201,  281 
Transformation,  333 
Transitory  arythmia,  83 
Trauma,  13 

sexual,  25,  271 
Travesty,  376 
Trembling,  attacks  of,  84 
Tucker,  Beverly  R.,  131 
Twofold  application,  335 

Unconscious;  35, 208, 281, 371, 377 

attachment,  282 

complexes,  160 

factors  in  neuroses,  123 

parental  influences,  271 

sadism,  115 

the  language  of,  112 
Unification  wit,  346,  357,  360 

Vain,  284 
Van  Dyke,  208 


INDEX 


393 


Vertigo,  84 
Violence,  323 
Vischer,  330 
Voyeurs,  285,  353 

Wanke,  319 
Waterman,  64 
Wernicke,  145 
Wildman,  275 
Will,  enfeeblement  of,  91 
Wish,  166 

hidden,  372 
Wishes,  fulfilment  of,  28.  42,  254 

hidden,  43 

fulfilment  of,  98 

unattainable,  17,  210 
Wish-phantasies,  249 

homosexual,  189,  196 
Wit  and  dreams,  371 

and  the  unconscious,  371 

character  of,  351 

discrepancies  in,  331 

distribution,  365 

diversities  in,  331 

divisions  of,  330 


Wit,  harmless,  350,  355,  358,  368 

motives  of,  369 

obscene,  364 

of  aggression,  370 

psychogenesis  of,  358 

purposeful,  350 

purposeless,  364 

social  process,  369 

technic  of,  331,  350 

theory  of,  330 
Wit-making,  365,  369 
Witticism,  350,  364 
Woman,  353 

unyieldingness  of,  354 
Words,  obscene,  352 

playing  with,  361 

witty,  339,  350 
World  system,  204 

Zones,  21 

anal,  322,  327 

erogenous,  22,  282,  321,  327,  328 

genital,  23 
Zoophilia,  113 
Zurich  school,  20,  56,  138,  146 


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c\otv»  $x>5o 

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3-25  8.00 


Gr     -c'  Gonotrbea  u      mpends .  •  ■  •  ....•••         2 

SSI|gE,©feMtto.  Urinary, 
Chemistry,  Eye,  Ear,  Nose, 
and  Throat,  and  Dental 

W.  B.  SAUNDERS   COMPANY 

WEST  WASHINGTON  SQUARE  PHILADELPHIA 

9,  HENRIETTA   STREET,   COVENT  GARDEN,  LONDON 


Davis'   Accessory  Sinuses 

Development  and  Anatomy  of  the  Nasal  Accessory  Sinuses  in 
Man.  By  Warren  B.  Davis,  M.  D.,  Corinna  Borden  Keen  Research 
Fellow  of  the  Jefferson  Medical  College,  Philadelphia.  Octavo  of  172 
pages,  with  57  original  illustrations.  Cloth,  $3.50  net. 

ORIGINAL  DISSECTIONS 

This  book  is  based  on  the  study  of  two  hundred  and  ninety  lateral  nasal  walls, 
presenting  the  anatomy  and  physiology  of  the  nasal  accessory  sinuses  from  the 
sixtieth  day  of  fetal  life  to  advanced  maturity.  It  represents  the  original  research 
work  and  personal  dissections  of  Dr.  Davis  at  the  Daniel  Baugh  Institute  of 
Anatomy  of  Philadelphia  and  at  the  Friedrichshain  Krankenhaus  of  Berlin.  It 
was  necessary  for  Dr,  Davis  to  develop  a  new  technic  by  which  the  accessory 
sinus  areas  could  be  removed  en  masse  at  the  time  of  postmortem  examinations, 
and  still  permit  of  reconstruction  of  the  face  without  marked  disfigurement. 
Ninety-six  cases  in  this  series  were  thus  obtained.  The  tables  of  averages,  giving 
you  the  age,  size  of  ostia,  origin,  thickness  of  septum,  and  anterior  and  posterior 
walls,  vertical,  lateral,  and  posterior  diameters,  and  relation  to  the  nasal  lloor, 
form  an  extremely  valuable  feature. 


SAUNDERS'    BOOKS    ON 


StelwagonV 
Diseases  of  the  Skin 


A  Treatise  on  Diseases  of  the  Skin.  By  Henry  W.  Stelwagon, 
M.  D.,  Ph.  D.,  Professor  of  Dermatology  in  the  Jefferson  Medical 
College,  Philadelphia.  Octavo  of  1250  pages,  with  331  text-cuts  and 
33  plates.  Cloth,  $6.00  net;  Half  Morocco,  $7.50  net. 

THE  NEW  (7th)   EDITION 

There  are  two  features  in  Dr.  Stelwagon' s  work  that  stand  out  above  all  the 
others  :  The  special  emphasis  given  the  two  practical  phases  of  the  subject — 
diagnosis  and  treatment;  and  the  wealth  of  illustrations.  These  latter  are  of  real 
value.  They  teach  you  diagnosis  as  no  description  can.  Many  of  these  illustra- 
tions are  in  colors. 

Over  75  pages  of  the  work  are  devoted  to  syphilis,  giving  you  the  Wassermann 
test,  the  salvarsan  ("606")  treatment,  and  all  the  newest  advances.  Pellagra, 
tropical  affections,  hookworm  disease.  Oriental  sore,  ringworm,  impetigo  contagiosa 
— all  those  diseases  being  so  widely  discussed  to-day. 

George  T.  Elliot,  M.  D.,   Professor  of  Dermatology,  Cornell  University. 

"  It  is  a  book  that  I  recommend  to  my  class  at  Cornell,  because  for  conservative  judgment, 
for  accurate  observation,  and  for  a  thorough  appreciation  of  the  essential  position  of  derma- 
tology, I  think  it  holds  first  place." 


Schamberg's  Diseases  of  the  Skin 
arid  Eruptive  Pevers 


Diseases  of  the  Skin  and  the  Eruptive  Fevers.  By  Jay  F.  Schamberg, 
M.  D.,  Professor  of  Dermatology  and  the  Infectious  Eruptive  Diseases,  Philadel- 
phia  Polyclinic.      Octavo  of  585  pages,  illustrated.      Cloth,  $3.00  net. 

NEW  (3d)  EDITION 

"  The  acute  eruptive  fevers  constitute  a  valuable  contribution,  the  statements  made 
emanating  from  one  who  has  studied  these  diseases  in  a  practical  and  thorough  manner  from 
the  standpoint  of  cutaneous  medicine.  .  .  .  The  views  expressed  on  all  topics  are  con- 
servative, safe  to  follow,  and  practical,  and  are  well  abreast  of  the  knowledge  of  the  present 
time,  both  as  to  general  and  special  pathology,  etiology,  and  treatment." — American  Journal 
of  Medical  Sciences. 


GENITO- URINARY  DISEASES 


Norris' 
Gonorrhea  in  Women 

Gonorrhea  in  Women.  By  Charles  C.  Norris,  M.  D.,  Instructor 
in  Gynecology,  University  of  Pennsylvania,  with  an  Introduction  by 
John  G.  Clark,  M.  D.,  Professor  of  Gynecology,  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania.    Large  octavo  of  520  pages,  illustrated.  Cloth,  $6.00  net. 

A  CLASSIC 

Dr.  Norris  here  presents  a  work  that  is  destined  to  take  high  place  among 
publications  on  this  subject.  He  has  done  his  work  thoroughly.  He  has  searched 
the  important  literature  very  carefully,  over  2300  references  being  utilized. 
This,  coupled  with  Dr.  Norris'  long  experience,  gives  his  work  the  stamp  of 
authority.  The  chapter  on  serum  and  vaccine  therapy  and  organotherapy  is 
particularly  valuable  because  it  expresses  the  newest  advances.  Every  phase  of 
the  subject  is  considered. 

Pennsylvania  Medical  Journal 

"  Dr.  Norris  has  succeeded  in  presenting  most  comprehensively  the  present  knowledge  of 
gonorrhea  in  women  in  its  many  phases.  The  present  status  of  serum  and  vaccine  therapy  is 
given  in  detail." 


Braasch's  Pyelography 

Pyelography.     By  William  F.  Braasch,  M.  D.,  The  Mayo  Clinic, 

Rochester,  Minn.     Octavo  of  323  pages,  with  296  pyelograms.     Cloth, 

$5.00  net. 

A   NEW   WORK 

Dr.  Braasch's  new  work  is  the  first  comprehensive  collection  of  the  various  types  of 
pelvic  outlines,  both  normal  and  pathologic.  You  get  here  296  skiagrams  of  the  renal  pel- 
vis and  ureter,  selected  from  several  thousand  plates  made  at  the  Mayo  Clinic.  These  pye- 
lograms, together  with  the  clear  descriptions,  constitute  an  admirable  aid  to  the  differential 
diagnosis  of  the  various  conditions  affecting  the  renal  pelvis.  The  characteristic  pelvic  out- 
line in  each  disease  is  first  shown  you  by  the  excellent  pyelograms;  then  Dr.  Braasch  inter- 
prets these  pyelograms  for  you  in  diagnostic  terms.  You  get  the  history  of  pyelography,  the 
exact  technic  (selection  of  the  medium,  preparation  of  solution,  method  of  injection,  sources 
of  error,  results),  the  normal  pelves,  the  various  pathologic  outlines,  and  the  outlines  in  con- 
genital anomalies.     It  is  a  most  complete  work. 


SAUNDERS'     BOOKS    ON 


Barn  hill   and  Wales' 
Modern   Otology 

A  Text-Book  of  Modern  Otology.  By  John  F.  Barnhill,  M.  D., 
Professor  of  Otology,  Laryngology,  and  Rhinology,  and  Earnest 
de  W.  Wales,  M.  D.,  Associate  Professor  of  Otology,  Laryngology, 
and  Rhinology,  Indiana  University  School  of  Medicine,  Indianapolis. 
Octavo  of  598  pages,  with  314  original  illustrations.  Cloth,  $5.50  net; 
Half  Morocco,  £7.00  net. 

THE  NEW  (2d)  EDITION 

The  authors,  in  writing  this  work,  kept  ever  in  mind  the  needs  of  the 
physician  engaged  in  general  practice.  It  represents  the  results  of  personal 
experience  as  practitioners  and  teachers,  influenced  by  the  instruction  given  by 
such  authorities  as  Sheppard,  Dundas  Grant,  Percy  Jakins,  Jansen,  and  Alt. 
Much  space  is  devoted  to  prophylaxis,  diagnosis,  and  treatment,  both  medical 
and  surgical.  There  is  a  special  chapter  on  the  bacteriology  of  ear  affections — 
a  feature  not  to  be  found  in  any  other  work  on  otology.  Great  pains  have  been 
taken  with  the  illustrations,  in  order  to  have  them  as  practical  and  as  helpful  as 
possible,  and  at  the  same  time  highly  artistic.  A  large  number  represent  the 
best  work  of  Mr.  H.  F.  Aitken. 


Coolidge  on  Nose  and  Throat 

Manual  of  Diseases  of  the  Nose  and  Throat.  By  Algernon  Cool- 
idge, M.  D.,  Professor  of  Laryngology,  Harvard  Medical  School. 
Octavo  of  360  pages,  illustrated.     Cloth,  $1.50  net. 

This  new  book  furnishes  the  student  and  practitioner  a  guide  and  ready  reference  to  the 
important  details  of  examination,  diagnosis,  and  treatment.  Established  facts  are  empha- 
sized and  unproved  statements  avoided.  Anatomy  and  physiology  of  the  different  regions 
are  included. 

Frank  Allport,   M.  D. 

Professor  of  Otology,  Northwestern  University,  Chicago. 

"  I  regard  it  as  one  of  the  best  books  in  the  English  language  on  this  subject.  The 
pictures  are  especially  good,  particularly  as  they  are  practically  all  original  and  not  the  old 
reproduced  pictures  so  frequently  seen." 


DISEASES   OF   THE  EYE. 


DeSchweinitz's 
Diseases  of  the  Eye 

Just  Out— New  (8th)  Edition 


Diseases  of  the  Eye:  A  Handbook  of  Ophthalmic  Practice. 
By  G.  E.  deSchweinitz,  M.D.,  Professor  of  Ophthalmology  in  the  Uni- 
versity of  Pennsylvania,  Philadelphia,  etc.  Handsome  octavo  of  754 
pages,  386  text-illustrations,  and  7  chromo-lithographic  plates.  Cloth, 
$6.00  net ;  Sheep  or  Half  Morocco,  $7.50  net. 

THE  STANDARD  AUTHORITY 

The  new  matter  added  includes:  Walker's  testing  of  visual  field,  squirrel 
plague  conjunctivitis,  swimming  bath  conjunctivitis,  anaphylactic  keratitis,  family 
cerebral  degeneration  with  macular  changes,  ocular  symptoms  of  pituitary 
disease,  sclerectomy  with  a  punch,  preliminary  capsulotomy,  iridotasis,  thread 
drainage  of  anterior  chamber,  extraction  of  cataract  in  capsule  after  subluxation 
of  lens  with  capsule  forceps,  capsulomuscular  advancement  with  partial  resection, 
tenotomy  of  inferior  oblique,  window  resection  of  nasal  duct. 


Bass   and   Johns'   Alveolodental   Pyorrhea 

Alveolodental  Pyorrhea.  By  Charles  C.  Bass,  M.  D.,  Professor 
of  Experimental  Medicine,  and  Foster  M.  Johns,  M.  D.,  Instructor  in 
the  Laboratories  *of  Clinical  Medicine,  Tulane  Medical  College.  Octavo 
of  168  pages,  illustrated.  Cloth,  $2.50  net. 

Drs.  Bass  and  Johns  present  their  subject  from  the  viewpoint  of  infection  by 
the  Endamceba  buccalis.  You  get  a  full  account  of  the  Endamceba  buccalis,  the 
history  of  disease,  the  morbid  processes,  contagiousness,  symptomatology,  how 
to  make  your  diagnosis  from  the  history  and  microscopic  examination,  prophy- 
laxis, and  the  exact  technic  for  using  emetin  hydrochlorid.  You  get  the  action 
of  emetin  upon  the  Endamceba,  you  get  the  exact  dosage,  you  get  the  interval 
between  doses,  the  local  effect,  the  urticaria  produced,  the  technic  of  injection. 

University  oi  Pennsylvania  Medical  Bulletin 

"Upon  reading  through  the  contents  of  this  book  we  are  Impressed  by  tne  remarkable 
fulness  with  which  it  reflects  the  notable  contributions  recently  made  to  ophthalmic  literature. 
No  important  subject  within  its  province  has  been  neglected." 


SALWDERS'   BOOKS    ON 


GET  A  •  THE  NEW 

THE    BEST  /V  lH  6  f  1  C  Si  II  STANDARD 

Illustrated   Dictionary 

New  (8th)  Edition— 1500  New  Terms 


The  American  Illustrated  Medical  Dictionary.  A  new  and  com- 
plete dictionary  of  the  terms  used  in  Medicine,  Surgery,  Dentistry, 
Pharmacy,  Chemistry,  Veterinary  Science,  Nursing,  and  kindred 
branches;  with  over  1 00  new  and  elaborate  tables  and  many  illustra- 
tions. By  W.  A.  Newman  Dorland,  M.D.,  Editor  of  "  The  American 
Pocket  Medical  Dictionary."  Large  octavo,  with  1 137  pages,  bound  in 
full  flexible  leather.      Price,  $4.50  net;  with  thumb  index,  $5.00  net. 

KEY  TO  CAPITALIZATION  AND  PRONUNCIATION— ALL  THE  NEW  WORDS 

This  dictionary  is  the  "new  standard."  It  defines  hundreds  of  the  newest 
terms  not  defined  in  any  other  dictionary — bar  none.  These  terms  are  live, 
active  words,  taken  right  from  modern  medical  literature. 

Howard  A.  Kelly,  M.  D., 

Professor  of  Gynecologic  Surgery,  Johns  Hopkins  University,  Baltimore 

"  Dr.  Dorland's  Dictionary  is  admirable.     It  is  so  well  gotten  up  and  of  such  convenient 
size.     No  errors  have  been  found  in  my  use  of  it." 

Theobald's  Prevalent  Eye  Diseases 


Prevalent  Diseases  of  the  Eye.  By  Samuel  Theobald,  M.  D., 
Clinical  Professor  of  Ophthalmology  and  Otology,  Johns  Hopkins 
University.  Octavo  of  5  50  pages,  with  219  text-cuts  and  several  colored 
plates.     Cloth,  $4.50  net ;  Half  Morocco,  $6.00  net. 

THE    PRACTITIONER'S    OPHTHALMOLOGY 

With  few  exceptions  all  the  works  on  diseases  of  the  eye,  although  written 
ostensibly  for  the  general  practitioner,  are  in  reality  adapted  only  to  the  specialist ; 
but  Dr.  Theobald  in  his  book  has  described  very  clearly  and  in  detail  those  condi- 
tions, the  diagnosis  and  treatment  of  which  come  within  the  province  of  the  general 
practitioner.  The  therapeutic  suggestions  are  concise,  unequivocal,  and  specific. 
It  is  the  one  work  on  the  Eye  written  particularly  for  the  general  practitioner. 

Charles  A.  Oliver,  M.D., 

Clinical  Professor  of  Ophthalmology,   Woman's  Medical  College  of  Pennsylvania. 

"  I  feel  I  can  conscientiously  recommend  it,  not  only  to  the  general  physician  and  medical 
student,  for  whom  it  is  primarily  written,  but  also  to  the  experienced  ophthalmologist.  Mosl 
surely  Dr.  Theobald  has  accomplished  his  purpose." 


DISEASES   OF   THE  EYE. 


Haab  and  DeSchweinitz's 
External  Diseases  of  the  Eye 


Atlas  and  Epitome  of  External  Diseases  of  the  Eye.     By  Dr.  O. 

Haab,  of  Zurich.  Edited,  with  additions,  by  G.  E.  deSchweinitz, 
M.  D.,  Professor  of  Ophthalmology,  University  of  Pennsylvania.  With 
IOI  colored  illustrations  on  46  lithographic  plates  and  244  pages  of 
text.     Cloth,  $3.00  net.     In  Saunders"  Hand-Atlas  Scries. 

THE   NEW    (3d)    EDITION 

Conditions  attending  diseases  of  the  external  eye,  which  are  often  so  complicated, 
have  probably  never  been  more  clearly  and  comprehensively  expounded  than  in 
the  forelying  work,  in  which  the  pictorial  most  happily  supplements  the  verbal 
description.     The  price  of  the  book  is  remarkably  low. 

The  Medical  Record,  New  York 

"  The  work  is  excellently  suited   to  the  student  of  ophthalmology  and   to  the  practising 
physician.     It  cannot  fail  to  attain  a  well-deserved  popularity.*' 

Haab  and  DeSchweinitz V 
Ophthalmoscopy 


Atlas  and  Epitome  of  Ophthalmoscopy  and  Ophthalmoscopic 
Diagnosis.  By  Dr.  O.  Haab,  of  Zurich.  Edited,  with  additions,  by 
G.  E.  deSchweinitz,  M.  D.,  Professor  of  Ophthalmology,  University 
of  Pennsylvania.  With  152  colored  lithographic  illustrations  and  92 
pages  of  text.     Cloth,  $3.00  net.     /;/  Saunders'  Hand-Atlas  Series. 

THE  NEW    (2d)    EDITION 

The  great  value  of  Prof.  Haab's  Atlas  of  Ophthalmoscopy  and  Ophthalmo- 
scopic Diagnosis  has  been  fully  established  and  entirely  justified  an  English 
translation.  Not  only  is  the  student  made  acquainted  with  carefully  prepared 
ophthalmoscopic  drawings  done  into  well-executed  lithographs  of  the  most  im- 
portant fundus  changes,  but,  in  many  instances,  plates  of  the  microscopic  lesions 
are  added.     The  whole  furnishes  a  manual  of  the  greatest  possible  service. 

The  Lancet,  London 

"We  recommend  it  as  a  work  that  should  be  in  the  ophthalmic  wards  or  in  the  library  of 
every  hDspital  into  which  ophthalmic  cases  are  received." 


S.KXDEIiS'   BOOKS  OJV 


Gradle's 
Nose,  Pharynx,  and  Ear 

Diseases  of  the  Nose,  Pharynx,  and  Ear.  By  Henry  Gradle, 
M.D.,  late  Professor  of  Ophthalmology  and  Otology,  Northwestern 
University  Medical  School,  Chicago.  Octavo  of  547  pages,  illustrated, 
including  two  full-page  plates  in  colors.     Cloth,  $3.50  net. 

INCLUDING  TOPOGRAPHIC  ANATOMY 

This  volume  presents  diseases  of  the  Nose,  Pharynx,  and  Ear  as  the  author 
has  seen  them  during  an  experience  of  nearly  twenty-five  years.  In  it  are 
answered  in  detail  those  questions  regarding  the  course  and  outcome  of  diseases 
which  cause  the  less  experienced  observer  the  most  anxiety  in  an  individual  case. 
Topographic  anatomy  has  been  accorded  liberal  space. 

Pennsylvania  Medical  Journal 

"This  is  the  most  practical  volume  on  the  nose,  pharynx,  and  ear  that  has  appeared 
recently.  ...  It  is  exactly  what  the  less  experienced  observer  needs,  as  it  avoids  the  confusion 
incident  to  a  categorical  statement  of  everybody's  opinion." 

Kyle's 
Diseases  of  Nose  and  Throat 


Diseases  of  the  Nose  and  Throat.  By  D.  Braden  Kyee,  M.  D.9 
Professor  of  Laryngology  in  the  Jefferson  Medical  College,  Phila- 
delphia. Octavo,  825  pages;  with  2£c  illustrations,  28  in  colors. 
Cloth,  $4.50  net;  Half  Moroccc,  £>6.oo  net. 

THE  NEW  (5th)  EDITION 

The  new  {stli)  edition  of  Dr.  Kyle' s  work  shows  an  increase  of  too  pages  and 
some  40  new  illustrations.  The  following  new  articles  have  been  added  :  vaccine 
therapy  ;  lactic  bacteriotherapy ;  salvarsan  in  the  treatment  of  syphilis  of  the  upper 
respiratory  tract  ;  sphenopalatine  ganglia  neuralgia  ;  negative  air-pressure  in  ac- 
cessory sinus  disease  ;  chronic  hyperplastic  ethmoiditis  ;  and  congenital  insuffi- 
ciency of  the  palate.  The  tables  of  differential  diagnosis  and  the  prescriptions  are 
striking  points  of  Dr.  Kyle's  book. 

Pennsylvania  Medical  Journal 

"  l)r.  Kyle's  crisp,  terse  diction  has  enabled  the  inclusion  of  all  needful  nose  and  throat 
knowledge  in  this  book." 


URINE  AND   IMPOTENCE. 


Og'den  on  the  Urine 


Clinical  Examination  of  Urine  and  Urinary  Diagnosis.  A  Clinical 
Guide  for  the  Use  of  Practitioners  and  Students  of  Medicine  and  Sur- 
gery. By  J.  Bergen  Ogden,  M.  D.,  Medical  Chemist  to  the  Metro- 
politan Life  Insurance  Company,  New  York.  Octavo,  418  pages,  54 
text  illustrations,  and  a  number  of  colored  plates.     Cloth,  $3.00  net. 

THE  NEW  (3d)  EDITION 

In  this  edition  the  work  has  been  brought  absolutely  down  to  the  present  day. 
Urinary  examinations  for  purposes  of  life  insurance  have  been  incorporated,  because 
a  large  number  of  practitioners  are  often  called  upon  to  make  such  analyses. 
Special  attention  has  been  paid  to  diagnosis  by  the  character  of  the  urine,  the 
diagnosis  of  diseases  of  the  kidneys  and  urinary  passages  ;  an  enumeration  of  the 
prominent  clinical  symptoms  of  each  disease  ;  and  the  peculiarities  of  the  urine 
in  certain  general  diseases. 

The  Lancet,  London 

"  We  consider  this  manual  to  have  been  well  compiled ;  and  the  author's  own  experience, 
sp  clearly  stated,  renders  the  volume  a  useful  one  both  for  study  and  reference." 

Pilcher's 
Practical  Cystoscopy 

Practical  Cystoscopy.  By  Paul  M.  Pilcher,  M.  D.,  Consulting 
Surgeon  to  the  Eastern  Long  Island  Hospital.  Octavo  of  504  pages, 
with  299  illustrations,  29  in  colors.      Cloth,  $6.00  net. 

NEW  (2d)  EDITION 

Cystoscopy  is  to-day  the  most  practical  manner  of  diagnosing  and  treating 
diseases  of  the  bladder,  ureters,  kidneys,  and  prostate.  To  be  properly  equipped, 
therefore,  you  must  have  at  your  instant  command  the  information  this  book  gives 
you.  It  explains  away  all  difficulty,  telling  you  why  you  do  not  see  something 
when  something  is  there  to  see,  and  telling  you  how  to  see  it.  All  theory  has 
been  uncompromisingly  eliminated,  devoting  every  line  to  practical,  needed- 
every-day  facts,  telling  you  how  and  when  to  use  the  cystoscope  and  catheter — 
telling  you  in  a  way  to  make  you  know.  The  work  is  complete  in  every  detail. 
Bransford  Lewis,  M.  D„  St.  Louis  University. 

"  I  am  very  much  pleased  with  Dr.  Pilcher's  '  Practical  Cystoscopy.'  I  think  it  is  the  best 
in  the  English  language  now." — April  27,  ign. 


io  SAUNDERS'   BOOKS    ON 

Goepp's 
Dental   State   Boards 

Dental  State  Board  Questions  and  Answers By  R.  Max  Goepp, 

M.  D.,  author  "  Medical  State  Board  Questions  and  Answers."     Octavo 
of  428  pages.      Cloth,  $2.75  net. 

NEW  (2d)   EDITION 

This  new  work  is  along  the  same  practical  lines  as  Dr.  Goepp's  successful  work 
on  Medical  State  Boards.  The  questions  included  have  been  gathered  from  reliable 
sources,  and  embrace  all  those  likely  to  be  asked  in  any  State  Board  examination 
in  any  State.  They  have  been  arranged  and  classified  in  a  way  that  makes  for  a 
rapid  resume  of  every  branch  of  dental  practice,  and  the  answers  are  couched  in 
language  unusually  explicit — concise,  definite,  accurate. 

The  practicing  dentist,  also,  will  find  here  a  work  of  great  value — a  work 
covering  the  entire  range  of  dentistry  and  extremely  well  adapted  for  quick 
reference. 

Haab  and  deSchweinitz's 
Operative  Ophthalmology 

Atlas  and   Epitome  of    Operative    Ophthalmology.       By  Dr.  O. 

Haab,  of  Zurich.  Edited,  with  additions,  by  G.  E.  de  Schweinitz, 
M.  D.,  Professor  of  Ophthalmology  in  the  University  of  Pennsylvania. 
With  30  colored  lithographic  plates,  1 54  text-cuts,  and  375  pages  of 
text,     In  Saunders1  Hand-Atlas  Series.     Cloth,  $3.50  net. 


Dr.  Haab's  Atlas  of  Operative  Ophthalmology  will  be  found  as  beautiful  and 
as  practical  as  his  two  former  atlases.  The  work  represents  the  author' s  thirty 
years'  experience  in  eye  work.  The  various  operative  interventions  are  described 
with  all  the  precision  and  clearness  that  such  an  experience  brings.  Recognizing 
the  fact  that  mere  verbal  descriptions  are  frequently  insufficient  to  give  a  clear 
idea  of  operative  procedures,  Dr.  Haab  has  taken  particular  care  to  illustrate 
plainly  the  different  parts   of  the   operations. 

Johns  Hopkins  Hospital  Bulletin 

"  The  descriptions  of  the  various  operations  are  so  clear  and  full  that  the  volume  can  welj 
hold  place  with  more  pretentious  text-books." 


GENITO- URINARY   AND    NOSE,     THROAT,     ETC.  u 


Greene  and  Brooks' 
Genito-Urinary  Diseases 

Diseases  of    the   Genito=Urinary  Organs  and   the   Kidney.      By 

Robert  H.  Greene,  M.  D.,  Professor  of  Genito-Urinary  Surgery  at 
Fordham  University ;  and  Harlow  Brooks,  M.  D.,  Assistant  Pro- 
fessor of  Clinical  Medicine,  University  and  Bellevue  Hospital  Medical 
School.  Octavo  of  639  pages,  illustrated.  Cloth,  $5.00  net;  Half 
Morocco,  $6.50  net. 

THE  NEW   (3d)  EDITION 

This  new  work  presents  both  the  medical  and  surgical  sides.  Designed  as  a 
work  of  quick  reference,  it  has  been  written  in  a  clear,  condensed  style,  so  that 
the  information  can  be  readily  grasped  and  retained.  Kidney  diseases  are  very 
elaborately  detailed. 

New  York  Medical  Journal 

"  As  a  whole  the  book  is  one  of  the  most  satisfactory  and  useful  works  on  genito-urinary 
diseases  now  extant,  and  will  undoubtedly  be  popular  among  practitioners  and  students." 

Gleason  on  Nose,  Throat, 

and  Ear 

A   Manual   of    Diseases  of   the    Nose,  Throat,  and    Ear.     By  E. 

Baldwin  Gleason,  M.  D.,  LL.  D.,  Professor  of  Otology,  Medico- 
Chirurgical  College,  Philadelphia.  i2tno  of  590  pages,  profusely  illus- 
trated.    Cloth,  $2.50  net. 

THE  NEW  (3d)  EDITION 

Methods  of  treatment  have  been  simplified  as  much  as  possible,  so  that  in 
most  instances  only  those  methods,  drugs,  and  operations  have  been  advised 
which  have  proved  beneficial.  A  valuable  feature  consists  of  the  collection  of 
formulas. 

American  Journal  of  the  Medical  Sciences 

"  For  the  practitioner  who  wishes  a  reliable  guide  in  laryngology  and  otology  there  are  few 
books  which  can  be  more  heartily  commended." 


American  Text=Book  of  Genito-Urinary  Diseases,  Syphilis,  and 
Diseases  of  the  Skin.  Ivlited  by  L.  Bolton  Bangs,  M.  D.,  ami 
W.  A.  Hardaway,  M.  D.  Octavo,  1229  pages,  300  engravings,  20 
colored  plates.     Cloth,  $7.00  net. 


12  SAUNDERS'  BOOKS  ON 

Holland's  Medical 
Chemistry  and  Toxicology 

A  Text-Book  of  Medical  Chemistry  and  Toxicology.  By  James 
W.  Holland,  M.  D.,  Emeritus  Professor  of  Medical  Chemistry  and 
Toxicology,  and  Dean,  Jefferson  Medical  College,  Philadelphia.  Octavo 
of  678  pages,  fully  illustrated.      Cloth,  $3.00  net. 

FOURTH  EDITION 

Dr.  Holland's  work  is  an  entirely  new  one,  and  is  based  on  his  forty  years* 
practical  experience  in  teaching  chemistry  and  medicine.  It  has  been  subjected  to 
a  thorough  revision,  and  enlarged  to  the  extent  of  some  sixty  pages.  The  additions 
to  be  specially  noted  are  those  relating  to  the  electronic  theory,  chemical  equilib- 
rium, Kjeldahl's  method  for  determining  nitrogen,  chemistry  of  foods  and  their 
changes  in  the  body,  synthesis  of  proteins,  and  the  latest  improvements  in  urinary 
tests.      More  space  is  given  to  toxicology  than  in  any  other  text-book  on  chemistry. 

American  Medicine 

"  Its  statements  are  clear  and  terse  ;  its  illustrations  well  chosen  ;  its  development  logical, 
systematic,  and  comparatively  easy  to  follow.  .  .  .  We  heartily  commend  the  work." 

Ivy's  Applied  Anatomy  and 

Oral  Surgery  for  Dental  Students 


Applied   Anatomy  and   Oral    Surgery  for  Dental  Students.     By 

Robert  H.  Ivy,  M.D.,  D.D.S.,  Assistant  Oral  Surgeon  to  the  Philadel- 
phia General  Hospital.  i2mo  of  280  pages,  illustrated.  Cloth,  $1.50 
net. 

FOR  DENTAL  STUDENTS 

This  work  is  just  what  dental  students  have  long  wanted — a  concise,  practical 
work  on  applied  anatomy  and  oral  surgery,  written  with  their  needs  solely  in 
mind.  No  one  could  be  better  fitted  for  this  task  than  Dr.  Ivy,  who  is  a  graduate 
in  both  dentistry  and  medicine.  Having  gone  through  the  dental  school,  he 
knows  precisely  the  dental  student's  needs  and  just  how  to  meet  them.  His 
medical  training  assures  you  that  his  anatomy  is  accurate  and  his  technic  modern. 
The  text  is  well  illustrated  with  pictures  that  you  will  find  extremely  helpful. 

H.  P.  Kuhn,  M.D.,  Western  Dental  College,  Kansas  City. 

"  I  am  delighted  with  this  compact  little  treatise.     It  seems  to  me  just  to  fill  the  bill." 


CHEMISTRY,   SKIN,  AND   VENEREAL    DISEASES.  13 

American  Pocket  Dictionary  New  9th  i  Edition 

The  American  Pocket  Medical  Dictionary.  Edited  by  W.  A. 
Newman  Dorland,  M.  D.,  Editor  "American  Illustrated  Medical 
Dictionary."  Containing  the  pronunciation  and  definition  of  the 
principal  words  used  in  medicine  and  kindred  sciences.  693  pages. 
Flexible  leather,  with  gold  edges,  #1.00  net;  with  thumb  index, 
$1.25  net. 

James  W.  Holland,  M.  D., 

Professor  of  Medical  Chemistry  and  Toxicology,  and  Dean,  Jefferson  Medical  College, 

Philadelphia, 

"  I  am  struck  at  once  with  admiration  at  the  compact  size  and  attractive  exterior.  1 
can  recommend  it  to  our  students  without  reserve." 

Stelwagon's  Essentials  of  Skin  7th  Edition 

Essentials  of  Diseases  of  the  Skin.  By  Henry  W.  Stel- 
wagon,  M.  D.,  Ph.D.,  Professor  of  Dermatology  in  the  Jeffer- 
son Medical  College,  Philadelphia.  Post-octavo  of  291  pages, 
with  72  text-illustrations  and  8  plates.  Cloth,  31.00  net.  In 
Saunders'  Question-  Compeud  Series. 
The  Medical  News 

"  In  line  with  our  present  knowledge  of  diseases  of  the  skin.  .  .  .  Continues  to  main- 
tain the  high  standard  of  excellence  for  which  these  question  compends  have  been  noted." 

Wolffs  Medical  Chemistry  New  (7th)  Edition 

Essentials  of  Medical  Chemistry,  Organic  and  Inorganic. 
Containing  also  Questions  on  Medical  Physics,  Chemical  Physiol- 
ogy, Analytical  Processes,  Urinalysis,  and  Toxicology.  By  Law- 
rence Wolff,  M.  D.,  Late  Demonstrator  of  Chemistry,  Jefferson 
Medical  College.  Revised  by  A.  Ferree  Witmer,  Ph.  G.,  M.  D., 
Formerly  Assistant  Demonstrator  of  Physiology,  University  of 
Pennsylvania.  Post-octavo  of  222  pages.  Cloth,  £1.00  net.  In 
Saunders1  Question- Compeud  Series. 

Bliss*  Qualitative  Chemical  Analysis 

Qualitative  Chemical  Analysis.  By  A.  R.  Bliss.  Jr.,  Ph.  G., 
M.  D.,  Professor  of  Chemistry  and  Pharmacy,  Birmingham 
Medical  College,  Alabama.  Octavo  of  250  pages.  Cloth,  S2.00 
net. 

Vecki's  Sexual  Impotence  New  (5th)  Edition 

Sexual  Impotence.  By  Victor  G.  Vecki,  M.  1)..  Consulting 
Genito-Urinary  Surgeon  to  Mt.  Zion  Hospital,  San  Francisco. 
l2mo  of  405  pages.     Cloth,  $2.25  net. 

Johns  Hopkins  Hospital   Bulletin 

"A  scientific  treatise  upon  an  important  and  much  neglected  subject.  .  .  .  The 
treatment  of  impotence  in  general  and  of  sexual  neurasthenia  is  discriminating  and 
'udicious." 


14  SAUNDERS1    BOOKS   ON 


Second 
Edition 


Wells'   Chemical  Pathology 

Chemical  Pathology.  Being  a  discussion  Of  General  Path- 
ology from  the  Standpoint  of  the  Chemical  Processes  Involved. 
By  H.  Gideon  Wells,  Ph.  D.,  M.  D.,  Assistant  Professor  of 
Pathology  in  the  University  of  Chicago.  Octavo  of  616  pages. 
Cloth,  $3.25  net. 

Wm.   H.  Welch.  M.  D.,  Professor  of  Pathology,  Johns  Hopkins  University. 

"  The  work  fills  a  real  need  in  the  English  literature  of  a  very  important  subject,  and 
I  shall  be  glad  to  recommend  it  to  my  students." 


The  New   (2d)   Edition 


Saxe's  Urinalysis 

Examination  of  the  Urine.  By  G.  A.  De  Santos  Saxe,  M.  D., 
formerly  Instructor  in  Genito-Urinary  Surgery,  New  York  Post- 
graduate Medical  School  and  Hospital.  i2mo  of  448  pages,  fully 
illustrated.     Cloth,  $1.75  net. 

Francis  Carter  Wood,  M.  D.,    Adjunct  Professor  of  Clinical  Pathology,  Columbia   Uni- 
versity. 

"It  seems  to  me  to  be  one  of  the  best  of  the  smaller  works  on  this  subject ;  it  is, 
indeed,  better  than  a  good  many  of  the  larger  ones."  % 

deSchweinitz  and  Randall   on  the  Eye,  Ear, 
Nose,  and  Throat 

American  Text-Book  of  Diseases  of  the  Eye,  Ear,  Nose,  and 
Throat.  Edited  by  G.  E.  de  Schweinitz,  M.D.,  and  B.  Alex- 
ander Randall,  M.D.  Imperial  octavo,  125 1  pages,  with  766 
illustrations,  59  of  them  in  colors.  Cloth,  $7.00  net;  Half  Mo- 
rocco, $8.50  net. 

Grunwald  and  Grayson  on  the  Larynx 

Atlas  and  Epitome  of  Diseases    of  the  Larynx.     By  Dr.  L. 

Grunwald,  of  Munich.  Edited,  with  additions,  by  Charles  P. 
Grayson,  M.D.,  University  of  Pennsylvania.  With  107  colored 
figures  on  44  plates,  25  text-cuts,  and  103  pages  of  text.  Cloth, 
$2.50  net.     In  Saunders   Hand-Atlas  Scries. 

Mracek  and  Stelwagon's  Atlas  of  Skin         f5££j 

Atlas  and  Epitome  of  Diseases  of  the  Skin.  By  Prof.  Dr. 
Franz  Mracek,  of  Vienna.  Edited,  with  additions,  by  Henry 
W.  Stelwagon,  M.D.,  Jefferson  Medical  College.  With  yy  col- 
ored plates,  50  half-tone  illustrations,  and  280  pages  of  text.  In 
Saunders?  Hand-Atlas  Scries.     Cloth,  $4.00  net. 


EYE,    EAR,    NOSE,    AND    THROAT.  13 

deSchweinitz    and    Holloway   on   Pulsating    Exoph- 
thalmos 

Pulsating  Exophthalmos.  An  analysis  of  sixty-nine  cases  not  pre- 
viously  analyzed.  By  George  E.  deSchweinitz,  M.  D.,  and  Thomas 
B.  Holloway,  M.  D.     Octavo  of  125  pages.     Cloth,  $2.00  net. 

This  monograph  consists  of  an  analysis  of  sixty -nine  cases  of  this  affection 
not  previously  analyzed.  The  therapeutic  measures,  surgical  and  otherwise, 
which  have  been  employed  are  compared,  and  an  endeavor  has  been  made 
to  determine  from  these  analyses  which  procedures  seem  likely  to  prove  of 
the  greatest  value.  It  is  the  most  valuable  contribution  to  ophthalmic  liter- 
ature within  recent  years. 

British  Medical  Journal 

"The  book  deals  very  thoroughly  with  the  whole  subject  and  in  it  the  most  complete  account  ot 
the  disease  will  be  found." 

Jackson  on  the  Eye  The  New  (2d)  Edition 

A  Manual  of  the  Diagnosis  and  Treatment  of  Diseases  of  the 
Eye.  By  Edward  Jackson,  A.  M.,  M.  D.,  Professor  of  Ophthalmology, 
University  of  Colorado.  i2mo  volume  of  615  pages,  with  184  beautiful 
illustrations.     Cloth,  $2.50  net. 

The  Medical  Record,  New  York 

"  It  is  truly  an  admirable  work.  .  .  .  Written  in  a  clear,  concise  manner,  it  bears  evidence  of  the 
author's  comprehensive  grasp  of  the  subject.  The  term  '  multum  in  parvo '  is  an  appropriate  one  to 
apply  to  this  work." 

Grant  on   Face,   Mouth,   and  Jaws 

A  Text-Book  of  the  Surgical  Principles  and  Surgical  Diseases 
of  the  Face,  Mouth,  and  Jaws.  For  Dental  Students.  By  H.  Horace 
Grant,  A.  M.,  M.  D.,  Professor  of  Surgery  and  of  Clinical  Surgery, 
Hospital  College  of  Medicine,  Louisville.  Octavo  of  231  pages,  with 
68  illustrations.     Cloth,  $2.50  net. 

Preiswerk  and  Warren's  Dentistry 

Atlas  and  Epitome  of  Dentistry.  By  Prof.  G.  Preiswerk,  of 
Basil.  Edited,  with  additions,  by  George  W.  Warren,  D.D.S.,  Pro- 
fessor of  Operative  Dentistry,  Pennsylvania  College  of  Dental  Surgery, 
Philadelphia.  With  44  lithographic  plates,  152  text-cuts,  and  343  pages 
of  text.      Cloth,  $3.50  net.     In  Saunders'  Atlas  Series. 

Asher's  Chemistry  and  Toxicology 

Chemistry  and  Toxicology  for  Nurses.  By  Philip  Asher,  Ph.G., 
M.  D.,  Dean  and  Professor  of  Chemistry,  New  Orleans  College  of  Phar- 
macy.     i2ino  of  190  pages.     Cloth,  $1.25  net. 


1 6  SAUNDERS'  BOOKS  ON 

Wolfs  Examination  of   Urine 

A  Laboratory  Handbook    of  Physiologic   Chemistry  and 

Urine-ex  \\n.\.\  i  ion.    By  Charles  G.  L.Wolf,  M.D.,  Instructor  in 

Physiologic   Chemistry,  Cornell   University  Medical   College,  New 

York.    1 2mo  volume  of  204  pages,  fully  illustrated.  Cloth,  #1.25  net. 

British  Medical  Journal 

"The  methods  of  examining  the  urine  are  very  fully  described,  and  there  are  at  the 
cml  of  the  book  some    extensive    tables   drawn   up  to  assist  in  urinary  diagnosis." 

Jackson's  Essentials  of  Eye  Third  Revised  Edition 

Essentials  of  Refraction  and  of  Diseases  of  the  Eye.  By 
Edward  Jackson,  A.  M.,  M.  D.,  Emeritus  Professor  of  Diseases  of 
the  Eye,  Philadelphia  Polyclinic.  Post-octavo  of  261  pages,  82  illus- 
trations.   Cloth,  $1.00  net.     ///  Saunders'  Question- Compend  Scries. 

Johns  Hopkins  Hospital  Bulletin 

"  The  entire  ground  is  covered,  and  the  points  that  most  need  careful  elucidation 
are  made  clear  and  easy." 

Gleason's  Nose  and  Throat  Fourth  Edition,  Revised 

Essentials  of  Diseases  of  the  Nose  and  Throat.     By  E.  B. 

Gleason,   S.  B.,    M.  D.,    Clinical    Professor    of   Otology,   Medico- 

Chirurgical  College,  Philadelphia,  etc.     Post-octavo,  241  pages,  1 12 

illustrations.     Cloth,  $1.00  net.      ///  Sounders'  Question  Compends, 

The  Lancet,  London 

"  The  careful  description  which  is  given  of  the  various  procedures  would  be  sufficient 
to  enable  most  people  of  average  intelligence  and  of  slight  anatomical  knowledge  to 
make  a  very  good  attempt  at  laryngoscopy." 

Gleason's  Diseases  of  the  Ear  Third  Edition,  Revised 

Essentials  of  Diseases  of  the  Ear.  By  E.  B.  Gleason,  S.  B., 
M.  D.,  Clinical  Professor  of  Otology,  Medico-Chirurgical  College, 
Phila.,  etc.  Post-octavo  volume  of  214  pages,  with  114  illustra- 
tions.    Cloth,  $1.00  net.     In  Saunders'  Question- Compend  Series. 

Bristol  Medico-Chirurgical  Journal 

"  We  know  of  no  other  small  work  on  ear  diseases  to  compare  with  this,  either  in 
freshness  of  style  or  completeness  of  information." 

Wilcox  on  Genito-Urinary  and  Venereal  Diseases 

The   New   (2d)    Edition 

Essentials  of  Genito-Urinary  and  Venereal  Diseases.  By 
Starling  S.  Wilcox,  M.  D.,  Lecturer  on  Genito-Urinary  Diseases 
and  Syphilology,  Starling-Ohio  Medical  College,  Columbus.  i2mo 
of  321  pages,  illustrated.     Cloth,  $1.00  net.     Saunders1  Compcuds. 

Stevenson's  Photoscopy 

Pi  1  otoscopy  (Skiascopy  or  Retinoscopy).  By  Mark  D.  Stev- 
enson, M.  D.,  Ophthalmic  Surgeon  to  the  Akron  City  Hospital. 
i2mo  of  126  pages,  illustrated.  Cloth,  81. 25  net. 

Edward  Jackson,   M.  D.,   University  of  Colorado. 

"  It  is  well  written  and  will  prove  a  valuable  help.  Your  treatment  of  the  emergent 
pencil  of  rays,  and  the  part  falling  on  the  examiner's  eye,  is  decidedly  better  than  any 
previous  account." 


14  DAY  USE 

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